Last weekend, Jesse Williams won the Humanitarian Award at the BET Award Show (link here). His acceptance speech was utilized as a way for him to speak out on social issues, specifically racial inequalities and police brutality. His words were eloquent and filled with passion and meaning, so naturally, right-winged Tomi Lahren had some "final thoughts" on his words (link here). Well, Tomi, I have some final thoughts of my own:

First off, I would like to start by saying that Tomi Lahren is a journalist, and I use this term very loosely. Journalism, or real journalism at least, requires research and time dedicated to learning both sides of every argument or topic being discussed. It should be unbiased and certainly not screamed at to an audience. My best bet is that Tomi is targeting a specific audience so that she is certain that they'll like what she has to say. With that, her ratings and viewings have and will continue to skyrocket which will probably earn her a comfy seat on Fox News.

Lahren's video starts off with a clip of Williams' comment on the inexcusable murder of Tamir Rice, a 12-year-old black boy.

Lahren then interjects by alluding to a completely different case (Michael Brown's death), claiming that an unarmed black man may not have had a gun but probably reached for the officer's. In Brown's case, there is no concrete evidence of this, but that's beside the point. Lahren defers the audience for having pity for a child who was murdered by police for thinking he was carrying a gun in an open carry state by bringing up a case where she knows she's right. She refuses to address Jesse's statement head on, and maneuvers around evidence to make it sound like she is right. This is the clear sign of a unseasoned journalist.

The video then cuts to a clip of Williams explaining the racial inequalities of present day America, so, of course, Lahren decides to take the argument into the past to prove she has a criticism of oppression. She speaks about the Civil War and how her white ancestors fought for slaves' freedom. For starters, I'm not entirely sure why she decided to bring up the past, as slavery is not what's being discussed. Williams speaks of present day America where the issues have not been resolved. Slavery has been ended, but racial prejudice is an ongoing reality. Tomi, it's time for a history lesson. Slaves didn't fight for their own freedom in the Civil War. Why? Because they were slaves and we're not free to do so. And if they did it was because they were instructed to do so by their owners. The Civil War was fought not over the morality of slavery, but rather the economic disparity between north and south. The north was industrialized and so the south saw abolitionists as working for northern interests. Whenever a law was passed limiting slavery, the south felt it in their economy as it depended on slaves. Therefore they decided to secede. The north didn't have to depend on slavery while the south did, and the south felt abolition country-wide was unfair. So claiming that her ancestors were blacks' ancestors' saving grace is unfair and shields her audience from historical evidence. Not to mention, if it hadn't been for white people, people of color would not have been enslaved in the first place.

Then, just as Lahren is condemning Williams of his speech splitting groups of people in two, she then does exactly the same. She speaks lowly of democrats and explains they were the racist ones during the civil war and were fighting for slavery. Though this is true, she fails to mention that the dynamic of the Democratic Party changed in the '60s and the party's racist ideals did a complete 180. This is not the first time Lahren talks poorly about liberals' views, and it certainly won't be her last. Now Tomi, don't you think that splitting republicans and democrats up into two is analogous to splitting blacks and whites into two? Lahren is a hypocrite.

Lahren then asks her audience the freedoms white people have that black people don't. What she fails to recognize is that though there may be laws on paper, oppression of people of color has been a common thread throughout history. The civil rights movement occurred when my parents were alive, and it effects are lasting. Tomi, let's looks at the statistics, shall we? There are legitimate statistics indicating that there is institutional racism, but she refuses to address that. A black child is eighteen times more likely to be charged as an adult than a white child for the same crime; these children make up more than 60% of kids in prison. Black people are twice as likely to receive the death penalty for murder than a white person. In the workplace, black college graduates are twice as likely to struggle to find jobs than white college graduates. How about some anecdotal evidence, Tomi: former Stanford student Brock Turner raped an unconscious girl behind a dumpster and got only six months in jail while former football star Brian Banks was accused of rape and received a six-year sentence. Five years into his sentence, the "victim" came forward only to say she made the whole thing up. So for the same crime (though one wasn't actually committed) the black man received a sentence twelve times as long

Tomi Lahren should rethink her career in journalism. She claims to have a passion for America and all of its issues but feels uncomfortable addressing issues that don't affect her. Why does the legitimate evidence of systematic oppression make her uncomfortable to the point where she refuses to present the facts to her viewers? Presenting one side of every argument is ridiculous. I respect that this is America and that every person has the right to his/her own opinion, but Lahren doesn't tell her opinion, she tells lies.