Black Lives Matter

We have some to a pivotal time in our country when white people such as myself need to say these works "Black lives matter!"  Some might day, "well, don't 'all lives matter?'"  Yes, that is true, and because that is true, we are outraged that black people keep ending up dead for doing things like walking with hoodie (Trayvon Martin) or jogging (Ahmaud Arbery) or many cases of just being stopped by the police.  

Trayvon Martin's case was 7 years ago now!  Not much has changed!  Racism persists.

Racism persists in blatant and latent ways.  The obvious includes blatant racists statements or actions.  The latent includes aspects of our upbringing and fears we have inside.  A white person may say they are not racist, but what is going through their minds when they see a black man ahead, or a couple of black teens ahead, while walking down the street at night?   Or if they see a black person where they don't expect to see one?  I don't know about others, but the thought comes to my mind.  I suspect this toxic stuff is in the minds of many a "liberal" or "not racist" white person.

The other latent persistence of racism is within the government, be it the police, the courts, the prisons, politicians, and social services.  A good example that I heard on the radio yesterday.  Why do many cops who've killed unarmed black people get exonerated in court?  Well, the standard that the jury is given is to ask themselves, "what would a 'reasonable' police officer do in the moment, knowing what he/she knows at the moment, and without the benefit of 20/20 hindsight that comes after the fact?"  With this standard, it's typically a revolving door:  go to trial, but get a verdict of innocent, and back to work.  There is a Federal precedent that police cannot use "unreasonable" force, but the standard given to the jury tends to favor the police, giving them the benefit of the doubt because, at the time, they didn't know everything about the circumstances.

Defund/Restructure/Eliminate the Police

These seem like really radical ideas, but not if we look a famous historic document, the Declaration of Independence:

All people "are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."

Note this statement: "whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends" (in this case, namely the unalienable right to life), "it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it."

With black people being killed by agents of the Government, "it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it."

If the police departments as currently structured are destructive of protecting black lives, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish the police departments.

If the current standards in our courts are destructive of providing justice in the taking of black lives, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it.

My conclusion is that it's the American way to alter or to abolish those portions of our government that have become destructive to the ends of protecting black lives.

Now we need to get to the work of change!

Grief in Florida

Where does one begin to describe the grief in Florida, where, yet again, evil intent in a man's heart rips again the fragile vale that separates this domain of the living where we dwell and the domain of death?  Lives lost.  Grief unreconciled.  

We've seen evidence of the carnage caused by this evil, sometimes in the hearts of misguided religious fanatics, sometimes in the hearts of others some with serious mental health issues, and others whose motives remain unknown.  In all cases, the evil consumes lives:  lives ended all too soon.  

And the grief spreads.  To families, to friends, to neighbors, colleagues, acquaintances, and those who hear the news.  Are we even at a point when virtually anyone in this land can name someone who died in a mass killing?

Will these horrors go on forever?  Can they be prevented?

Some point to a failure of the FBI to act on information about this perpetrator.  Some point to the need for more security.  Some point to gun control.  In many cases, there may not be definitive actionable information beforehand.  And in most schools there is a good degree of security, but short of armed troupes, could any security stop a well-armed intruder?

Perhaps, 20 to 30 years ago, the political climate allowed politicians to propose and enact "common sense gun control."  Now, this is virtually impossible in the face of a strong anti-gun-control lobby with ties to the current national majority party.  While millions own fire arms without harming others, in the hands of a person possessed by the evil to kill, a fire arm can magnitude that hate and evil within into the consumption of multiple innocent lives.  The weapon may not be inherently evil, but it can certainly magnify the damage of that evil.

I can only speak for myself, but at times I feel frustration and anger.  At those times, I would not want access to a weapon that would magnify that anger.  Better to wait for it to pass.  Better for it to remain no more than a passing series of pulses in the neurons of my brain.

In the end, there are no easy answers.  But we know that light overcomes the darkness.  We need to reach out and reinforces our bonds with family, friends, neighbors and others we come to know.  We need to talk, with open minds, about how to protect the innocent from the hate, anger, and frustration of those who might make manifest the evil within.  We need bolder leadership to lead the way, a leadership that we don't seem to have fostered of late, but perhaps that form of leadership will arise from the grief in Florida.