"This is not a plea to all police officers but toward any human being who fails to value life. The war on people of color and all minorities needs to be over" -Beyoncé
I just recently watched the video of Alton Sterling being shot in Baton Rouge on Tuesday. It was another scene where white police murdered a black person. It appeared that Sterling was minding his own business, selling CDs that he was permitted to sell by the local store owner, when white officers of the Baton Rouge Police Department shot him multiple times for no good reason. After Sterling was pinned down, one of the officers yelled that Sterling had a gun (although his hand was nowhere near it) and executed him.
It is ironic that people of color make an inherent threat to white police, even though it is a political right to retain gun permits to legally carry guns. Although Sterling did not have a permit to own a gun, there is another video of Philando Castile being shot by police even though he did have a permit. Castile was pulled over in Minneapolis for a broken taillight. When the officer asked for his license and registration, Castile informed the officer that he had a gun and a conceal-to-carry permit. Castile did not touch his gun yet the officer shot him. Castile’s girlfriend recorded the scene as she sat in the passenger seat while her four-year-old daughter sat in the back. It seems like whether you carry legally or not, any person of color with a gun is the pretext for police to shoot you down in cold blood. The lesson seems to be: dead if you do, dead if you don’t.
Innocent people are losing their lives. Unlike Castile, Sterling did have a criminal record. He was a registered sex offender and at age 21, he was convicted of "carnal knowledge of a juvenile". But at the time of Sterling’s death, he was not committing a crime and was never even convicted of a capital offense. His fate was ultimately no different than Castile. Record or no record, crime or no crime, death was their fate.
As stated by President Barack Obama, “This is not just a black issue, not just a Hispanic issue. This is an American issue”. However, people of color are more vulnerable to these horrible tragedies. The culture of white supremacy argues that black lives are a threat to the lives of white people. Pro-gun ideologues argue that guns are not the weapon, people are. Black people in particular. And that black people with guns are a lethal threat to white people. Contrastingly, white lives are inherently valuable, non-threatening and worthy of protection.
I watched these videos, followed news broadcasts, and read countless articles on these tragedies. I was left appalled, heartbroken, speechless, angry, and numb. The last thing that is going to help this situation is with more anger, more hate and more violence. It is not fair that these two men, along with many others, were unfairly treated by police and lost their lives. But it is also not fair of police officers to be shot and killed due to the acts of others. All lives, white, black, blue, purple, green, pink, whatever the color, are so valuable. It is our responsibility as Americans to speak up and make a change. We must peacefully demand changes to our judicial system so that brutality never goes unpunished again.
