“Every time you see me, you want to mess
with me”
These are some of the last words spoken by
Eric Garner.
You may remember his case.
Eric was arrested on suspicion of selling
illegal cigarettes in New York.
Despite being unarmed, he was placed in a
chokehold by officers, which according to
a medical examiner’s report, led to his
death, an hour later.
Those last words, “Every time you see me,
you want to mess with me”, have since been
taken up by a related cause: the Black Lives
Matter movement.
The movement began in 2013 in response to
a different high-profile and racially-charged
death: Trayvon Martin’s.
And it’s has since become a rallying cry
for all those, regardless of race, who yearn
for equality and justice.
I was very clear that those 3 words were something,
if it resonated for me, could resonate for
other black people and their allies.
That’s Patrisse Cullors, creator of the
hashtag and one of the co-founders of the
Black Lives Matter movement.
Patrisse watched cases like Trayvon Martin,
Michael Brown, and Eric Garner stir up a lot
of controversy and emotion in the country.
But to her, these incidents were a symptom
of a much larger issue.
An issue that she had very personal experience
with: the American Criminal Justice System,
and the racial biases running rampant there.
...It's not just the prisons, it's the police,
it's the courts, it’s the prison system,
it’s the entire apparatus….
….I think it’s my duty to support and
develop a new narrative and support and develop
new structures and new systems.
Looking at the facts, there is little doubt
that racial inequality exists within the criminal
justice system.
A 2008 report by The U.S. Department Of Justice,
stated that black drivers were roughly three
times as likely to be searched during a traffic
stop and twice as likely to be arrested than
white drivers.
They were also more likely to experience threats
or use of force during these interactions
with the police.
And it doesn’t stop there.
Incarceration rates disproportionately impact
men of color.
According to a 2014 report by the U.S.The
Department Of Justice, black men had the highest
imprisonment rate in every age group and were
in state or federal facilities up to 10 times
more often than white men.
For Patrisse, though, the problem isn’t
a bunch of statistics - it’s very real,
and it opens up another dimension of mass
incarceration: drug enforcement.
...Both my brother and father were addicted
to crack and my father was in and out of prison
most of his life,
...I say it was the war on drugs that killed
him, because instead of him having access
to treatment he was locked up and put in prison.
“The War On Drugs” refers to a set of
zero-tolerance, drug sentencing laws dating
back to the 1970’s.
Many argue that these strict policies are
responsible for the US’s prison population
expanding by approximately 700 percent.
The war drugs has even been described as the
“New Jim Crow”.
One critic argues that “the war has been
waged almost exclusively in poor communities
of color, even though studies consistently
show that people of all colors use and sell
illegal drugs at remarkably similar rates.”
None of these injustices - the war on drugs,
the prison system, racial profiling - were
lost on Patrisse as she grew up and became
politically active.
...I think it also shapes how you see the
world, it shapes how you see yourself, for
me early on I was very angry
…. I looked in my neighborhood and there
was no black lives matter, there was no organizers
knocking my door saying come join this movement.
there were no marches, people were just dying,
and people were being locked up, and I felt
like it was a trap, a trap for all of us...
…. My response was to fight, my response
was to join the movement.
And that movement she’s talking about is
Black Lives Matter.
Which, in spite of all the issues, histories
and politics it covers, is first and foremost
a sorely-needed call to action.
“...we have so many folks who are doing
such powerful work with black lives matter
in their own communities, whether that's initiating
conversations, whether that's using the black
lives matter to produce art, whether that
is doing brilliant actions around black lives
matter, or theorizing black lives matter means
in their context.”
Want to know more about what discrimination
looks like in America?
Watch this video.
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