Anybody who hasn't heard of the Black Lives Matter movement has probably been living under a rock. Just about everyone is already aware of the tragic death of Alton Sterling at the hands of a police officer, and the various shootings of police officers in a vile attempt at retaliation. The response has been uproarious. The internet has become a virtual war zone. Black Lives Matter was a movement that began in 2013 via Twitter hashtags in response to the shooting of Trayvon Martin, and it has come into full force today in the aftermath of recent events. The problem with all social media trends, however, is something similar to the telephone game. One person says one thing and another passes it on, and the real facts become distorted over time. The full picture is lost; only one small side of the story is presented at any given time. So what I would like to do is take the time to give a more well-rounded presentation of the hard data and examine what the Black Lives Matter movement really means for our society.
While the movement is well meant, I believe it is unfortunately named. When I first saw the hashtag, I was a little taken aback and at first I was offended at the implications. Of course black lives matter! The idea that anybody disagreed with that statement was a little preposterous to me. I live in a small southwestern Arizona town that is old-fashioned in many ways, not all of them good. I have heard the "n word" thrown around casually by older adults still living in an era gone by. I've witnessed rude stereotypes being expressed against those of Latin American descent, often by supposedly respectable members of the community. As a gay male, I've experienced discrimination and prejudices and had difficulty finding employment in my town. However, as outdated and behind the times as my community is, I couldn't imagine even the most prejudiced individuals I have had the displeasure of getting to know, expressing that black lives are somehow less important or less valuable than any others.
Statistically speaking, the number of deaths at the hands of police is alarmingly high. In 2015, a total of 990 people were shot and killed by American police. Of that number, 948 were men, 494 were white, and 256 were black, meaning that the remaining 240 belonged to various other racial minorities. Looking at raw numbers, of course it appears that there were more white people killed than black people. Now, some would argue that this is not taking into account the proportion of black to white people living in the United States; however, factoring in numbers like these is where it gets tricky, because it would have to be taken into consideration exactly where these shootings took place and the ratio of black to white population in each individual city to get a fair picture of how evenly dispersed the killings are. To me, however, the idea of finding proportions and calculations on the number of human lives lost based on the color of their skin seems callous and disrespectful. The number that concerns me the most is not 494 or 256; the most alarming number to read is 990. That is almost a thousand lives lost. A thousand people who had families and friends and lives and hopes and dreams, and a thousand people who now have none of those. I don't care what they looked like. I don't care what color they were. I care that they were all human beings. Do we really need to put labels on that?
I think our generation idolizes and admires the aesthetic of the sixties. In many ways, we are similar. It's all about free love and free weed, it's all about young people spreading peace and making change, and it's all about protests. The problem with that, however, is that there isn't really anything to protest anymore. The law of the land now is already equality. The law does not discriminate anymore based on race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, or social status. Our country has come pretty close to achieving full equality around the board. These race-based police shootings are not the norm and they are not socially acceptable. They are not condoned by the government or the law. And yet, we rally together and wave our signs and spread mass hysteria and panic and cause more harm and violence at our protests because we are making a difference. We shout and cry for change. But who are we shouting to? Who are we protesting against? The stark reality of the matter is, there is no one arguing the other side. I would go as far as to assume 99% of the nation agrees; of course black lives matter. There are no laws we need to change or reforms that can be made that would remedy the situation. Protests, counter-protests, anger, hate, all of these only spread more violence and intolerance.
The difficult part about the situation is there is not a real solution in sight. It is not cold and heartless to admit to this because it's a sad truth. There will always be hate. Things like this have been happening for years; the only difference now is that the media has the ability to whip everybody into a frenzy whenever they do. The simple fact of the matter is, yes, there are Howie Lakes and Blane Salamonis in the world. There will always be those few individuals who commit unspeakable acts of hate and violence because of their wrong views on race, gender, sexual orientation, social status, or religion. We can wave our signs and shout as loud as we want, but the truth is we will never be able to fully eliminate hate and ignorance. All we can do is respond when these incidents happen, and we do. The officers responsible for murdering Alton Sterling are going to get what's coming to them. But thankfully, people like these are rare. The existence of people like these is not justification to start an uproar. The existence of people like these is not justification to go and kill more innocent people.
The only real solution to the problem lies with individual actions and individual change. The real way to end racism is to stop labeling crimes like these by skin color; even further, to stop labeling people by skin color. Imagine a world where we didn't feel the need to look at someone and classify him or her as White, Black, Asian, Latino, Arab, Christian, Jewish, Muslim, man, woman, gay, straight, police, civilian, green, purple, orange. No matter what label used, to say one "type" of human matters is inherently discriminatory against the others. I say there should be no more "types" of people. The only label we need when dealing with one another, and the only label we should ever be using, is human. We are all human. We do not need to put each other in boxes and groups, because we all share this planet and we all live and love and dream together. Every life is of equal value. All lives matter.
