John Perazzo Black Lives Matter

The Black Lives Matter Movement: The Great Divide?

On, July 7th, 2016 eleven police officers were shot and five were killed by a sniper in Dallas, Texas during a peaceful protest. Micah Johnson, the black militant shooter, put fear in the hearts of many Americans suddenly pointing the attention from “Black Lives Matter,” to a new movement- “Blue Lives Matter.” However, many people simply disregard the fact that these shooters were not a part of the march nor supported by the protestors. Many protesters were also caught in the crossfire as well but this is not mentioned in mainstream media. Although the Black Lives Matter movement has spurred violence from solely radicals, the movement itself cannot be accused of creating a racial divide in

Taking population into account, “black Americans are 2.5 times as likely as white Americans to be shot and killed by police officers” (Lowery). On both sides of the coin, there are unjustly stolen lives. Police officers of all races are being targeted and African American children inherit disdain towards the men and women who simply wish to make a living. Similarly, African Americans are being targeted due to being considered criminals even though they themselves may be simply on their way home after picking up a pack of

Heather Mac Donald writes in her essay, “The Dangers Of The Black Lives Matter Movement” that “if we’re going to have a ‘Lives Matter’ anti-police movement, it would be more appropriately named ‘White and Hispanic Lives Matter.’” This prospective goes against the reason the Black Lives Matter Movement has been started. The movement is not intended to be divisive by saying solely, “black people killed by white police officers is all that matters.” The point of the movement is to acknowledge that black men and women are being targeted. It is far more diverse in uplifting the black community for example, the movement advocates for the “500,000 black people in the US [who] are undocumented immigrants” in addition to “black queer and trans folks” (About The Black Lives Matter Network). The movement itself can be compared to HBCUs, NAACP, and other movements that are created to uplift African Americans, not downgrade other races. This is the philosophy of targeted universalism. “Targeted universalism… [draws] our attention to structures and how different groups are situated with the structures so that we can develop strategies and pathways to get all to the universal goal” as well as create and more equal playing field for all races in this case