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| Black Lives Matter: Signs appear outside churches all over Huntsville |
"All Lives Matter" started with a set of town hall meetings in January. Lundy said about 500 adults attended these, but they needed a way to communicate their same concerns with the youth who weren't there. This helped cement the idea of a partnership with the police department.
"We talked about how we work together to prevent some of the negative outcomes that we experienced in Ferguson, Missouri, and Wisconsin and New York and Cleveland, Ohio," he said.
The first sign you are not helping is an endorsement by right wing, conservative, self proclaimed King of Hate Radio, host, Dale "Jackson" who writes:
The one thing lost in all the recent “Black Lives Matter” nonsense is the communities responsibility to respect law enforcement.See what I mean? Dale "Jackson" calls the #BlackLivesMatter movement nonsense, and believes that black people should respect law enforcement, even when they don't deserve respect.
This should be applauded and copied. Good job, Huntsville Housing Authority.
Young black males in recent years were at a far greater risk of being shot dead by police than their white counterparts – 21 times greater i, according to a ProPublica analysis of federally collected data on fatal police shootings.We all know that it's not about people of color not respecting law enforcement, it's about law enforcement not respecting people of color. You are sending the wrong message to young black/brown/poor males by teaching them how to be good Negroes. As black men you know good and well staying calm, doing as told, and not having a "bad attitude does not ensure you won't be beaten/ shot/ tased/ killed by police who are afraid of black people.
The 1,217 deadly police shootings from 2010 to 2012 captured in the federal data show that blacks, age 15 to 19, were killed at a rate of 31.17 per million, while just 1.47 per million white males in that age range died at the hands of police.
Let us be clear: We love, support, and pray for our police officers. We understand that many are doing an excellent job under extremely trying circumstances. We also understand that many officers are burdened by systems that routinely mete out inequitable racialized outcomes.
Let us also be clear to what started the #BlackLivesMatter movement in the first place.
The founders of #BlackLivesMatter are grateful that their message has been picked up by so many people as a rallying cry, but they want other groups that use the essence of the name, such as #MuslimLivesMatter and #LatinoLivesMatter, to find their own slogans.
“Not to say their lives don’t matter,” Tometi told the audience, “but we’ve been in a society that continues to marginalize black faces, and so we don’t want to see this kind of reappropriation and co-optation of #BlackLivesMatter as a hashtag.”The four of you are referred to as local black mentors , as such you have a responsibility and a duty to speak truth to power.
If "All Lives Matter' why is the focus on boys from 13-19 years old who live in public housing?
If it "aims to prevent a Ferguson, Mo.-type situation from happening in Huntsville, how is "some tough-love dialogue about how to behave when you're engaged by a police officer," going to prevent another #Ferguson?
Maybe you need to have a dialogue with police officers about how to interact with black males from 13-19 years old. After all, Ferguson started with #DarrenWilson telling #MikeBrown to get the F^&k out of the street and walk on the sidewalk and to "get the F#%k back."
It is wrong to teach black males from 13-19 how to "behave" when "engaged" by a police officer. It doesn't matter how black males "behave" they can still be beaten/shot/killed by police.
You're not helping.
Your friend,
RedEye
