I am not going to say much.
At this point, it is beating a dead horse.
The same week as our nation's holiday, which acknowledges freedom and opportunity, two men were killed by police officers and it was caught on video. This was then followed up by the shooting of police officers in Dallas, Texas during a protest.
We have seen too much lately that these actions seem to be recurring over and over again. Any time one of these tragedies occurs, activism on each side of varying degrees, occurs. Each side has an answer they know is right, that is how activism works, their cause is always the correct cause.
I am writing this, not because I am an activist or because I am directly affected by these events, because I am not. I am not black. I am not a police officer. I have not been directly affected by these actions, I have just observed.
What I have observed is that a solution, an answer, is simple. There is no simple answer.
The media does a ridiculously great job at being the Picasso of events. They paint a fantastic picture of a distorted reality the way they want the consumer to see. They make it seem simple, "Unarmed Black Man Killed by Police", "Police killed by angry sniper" and so on. Just our everyday encounters with people should be enough to tell us that there is always more to the story than just simple violence for no reason. There is always a motivation. Was the man that was killed truly innocent? Did something happen that they were involved with? If he was mixed up in the wrong situation, could he have avoided it? On the other side there are the police officers. Why did they pull the trigger? Why were they confronting the victim? What was their day like? What was their week like? What was it that put them in the frame of mind that told them pulling the trigger was the correct option?
See, in these situations we like to label: black man, police officer, but we forget that all parties involved share one distinct feature. They are human.
Human beings make mistakes. Humans make bad choices. Humans suffer from mental disorders that go unnoticed, especially when placed under excessive stress. Humans make poor choices out of desperation.
I am not going to offer solutions, I am in my 20s, my view of the world is much too confined to have solutions. All I am asking is that people please remember that we are all people. We are all human. We are all the same. When tragedies happen the reason may not be simple. The media reports a "story" not a truth. Drama is good for their wallets. Things need to change that is true, but we need to stop making this a labels problem.
We are all human, I don't have a solution to the problem, but admitting this may be a start.
