Many of us have seen on the news and social media the horrible story of four teens that tortured a mentally disabled man and live streamed it all on Facebook. Of course what they did was terrible, it was a hate crime, and they should be punished for it, but there's two things I want to point out: 1. This does not represent all African Americans or the Black Lives Matter movement and 2. What about John R.K Howard?
For those of you who don't know who Howard is, he is a white, high school football player who he and two other football players raped a black teen with mental disabilities with a coat hanger. Also, a horrible thing to do to a person, and do you think they are getting attention from the media? No. Jail time? No.
The four teens that tortured a man are charged with hate crimes, kidnapping, burglary, aggravated battery and aggravated unlawful restraint, as they rightfully should be, but how come these white teenagers aren't getting a single punishment? Howard doesn't even have to be classified as a sex offender. This wasn't the first time the black teen had to endure hate from the football players. There were many times they racial bullied him and had racial slurs yelled at him. The argument for Howard is that he has relatives that a prominent in the community, he's a football player, and because he's from Texas, that's why he was racist. I am not trying to lessen the degree of what the four teens did to the handicap man, but I can't understand why John R.K. Howard and his teammates aren't being charged. Oh wait, I do, it's because he's white. If the four black teens have to serve jail time, so should Howard. This is just another example of systemic racism and institutional racism.
I also want to point out that these four teens do not represent all African Americans. They do not all hate white people, and they wouldn't commit a crime like this. This doesn't represent Black Lives Matter either. Black Lives Matter is non-violent, they are a movement that is just trying to bring awareness to the racism and oppression still in this country. With that, I think I should also mention that Howard does not represent all white people either. We are not all racist, and a lot of us would agree that he should have the same punishment as the African American teens.
I want to bring light into this story, so maybe John R.K. Howard will get the punishment he deserves.
