I don't particularly know where to begin with this article. I also don't exactly know how to go about saying what I want to say without getting reprimanded by those around me. The Black Lives Matter movement is currently in full force. Someone was killed at a traffic stop. Police were killed by sniper fire. I don't know the full stories, and truthfully, you probably don't either. See, the media plays to the two sides. They're really good at either saying exactly what you want to hear or the complete opposite. That way they know they're getting your attention; they know they'll get some sort of reaction and they know that they're separating us. But we cannot be separated — we still must be united.

United States of America: The "Land of Opportunity." A place for people to be free. A place where people work together to make changes. Or did people forget that aspect? That, even though we are free, we are still one country. The U.S. Constitution states of our coming together as a country. The Constitution goes on to say that while each state can have its own defense, they are to work together. That each state may have some of their own rules or regulations, but ultimately, we are all under the power of the president.

Now, I don't know about you, but when I read that, I feel as though we are all supposed to be united and act like it. That while we may live separately and have representatives of each state, we are still one country, working together. We have fought for equality within our country. The Civil War is over. There have been countless protests for equality among different races, genders, religions, workforces, etc. And goodness people, open your eyes! Look at how far we have come! Look at all we have accomplished! I mean, for starters, slavery is out of the way. Our skin color doesn't determine which neighborhoods we can or cannot live in. Restaurants don't close their doors to people based on their skin. We can all share the same bathrooms, schools, apartment buildings, grocery stores, etc.

But there is always more work to be done.

The more and more commonly publicized accounts of police brutality are sickening. They are sickening on so many levels. To start, it hurts a family, a friend, a community, every time someone is killed. It doesn't matter who it is, they were someone's friend, someone's son. It hurts. But I invite you, as respectfully as I can, to look at a larger picture. While it was extremely difficult to find reputable statistical information due to the bombardment of internet posts related to "shootings by police," I made it work. And, by the looks of it, our people are not appearing very united.

According to the Washington Post, in the year 2015, 990 people were shot and killed by police. Very few of these people were women. But, 494 of them were, in fact, were white, while 258 of them were black, and 172 of them were Hispanic. The remaining 66 were either "other" or unknown. So far in 2016, about 530 people have been killed by police.

According to the Gun Violence Archive, just in the year 2016 so far, there have been over 28,000 incidents with guns, either killing or harming an individual. Only 982 of those incidents involved police. Over 7,000 of them, however, did result in deaths.

Those are not particularly the statistics I thought I would find, considering what we are actually being told and what is actually being reported.

When we log onto Facebook, or Twitter, or turn on the news, we so commonly see "killed by police" or "officer beats unarmed man." Each typically leads to how an officer killed or severely injured an innocent person. Sometimes, it's completely true. I will not be ignorant to the fact that there are still people out there who lack respect for the Black community. It's a well-known fact. Is it unfortunate that some of those people end up being the ones meant to protect us all? Extremely. But, with the uprising of Black Lives Matter, it has become less and less common to report other significant events happening. And when they are reported, race isn't mentioned, whether the event is good or bad. There are no riots or protests to shut down major roads for the two toddlers shot during a drive-by in Minneapolis — just a rally that hardly made its way into the public eye. There are no protests for the many accidents and deaths caused by distracted driving. Do they matter? Or are they just not as big of a deal because their headline wasn't "Black Toddlers Killed" or "Black Pedestrian Hit"? I'm not denying that there are problems out there, but I think everyone needs to take a step back before they start pointing fingers at who they think is in the wrong, or comparing convictions between skin colors. Nobody, or hardly anybody, really has the full stories.

And I'm telling you people, the very largest majority of police don't leave their house in the morning thinking, "I'm going to kill someone today," or "I hope I get to beat someone and shove them to the ground." The very largest majority of police leave their house ready to protect, serve and then get back to their families at the end of the day. They do their job to the best of their ability, and I find it hard to believe that any of us have enough information to criticize them on that.

In all of this, don't jump to conclusions for my personal opinion. Black lives most certainly do matter. Contrary to popular belief, my support for our police does not mean I hate the Black community. I strongly care about equality among our country, for every legal citizen. I care about people feeling safe wherever they go. Martin Luther King Jr. put up a strong, violence-free fight for that. He used peace, love and compassion to fight back. He refused to even have armed bodyguards, despite the death threats. And, he based his ideals partially on fighting evil itself, not the people committing evil acts. He also based them on refusing to hate his opponent, just as he would refuse to harm him. That would be a country working together, and those are actions that I support. Those are the types of actions that will keep us moving forward.

It's quite common to hear people say we have taken too many steps backward to be proud of the steps we took forward. And this is not a case of pointing fingers or "he said / she said". This is on us all. We are all the human race, and that is the only race that needs to stand out. We do not need to continue looking at things, and people, in black and white. If we only see in black and white, our unity suffers even more, and our country will become the States of America rather than the United States of America.