Black Lives Matter
Black lives matter is a political and social movement originating among African Americans, emphasizing basic human rights and equality. Black lives matter started in 2013 when people started using the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter on social media after the acquittal of George Zimmerman in the shooting death of African-American teen Trayvon Martin in February 2012 because black people weren't being treated the same. It started because Black people were being treated differently and right now everyone should be treated the same. The year is 2020 and people still act like it's the 1900s!
The purpose of Black Lives Matter is to spread awareness and to make a change for equality. The sad thing is that Black Lives Matter doesn't affect any social class, age, etc, it only affects your skin color which is very sad because no one can control their skin color, so it affects African Americans and people who are dark skin. It isn't only happening in America, protests are happening all over the world like the UK, Germany, Italy, New Zealand, Canada, Palestine, Syria, and other places, but it's mostly happening in America. For things to change powerful people need to help.
Protests are happening for Black Lives Matter and I think that what the people are doing is good because they are protesting for equality, but some people are taking advantage of the protests and use it to destroy things which makes people think that all these protests are useless, and the powerful people like lawyers, police officers, the president, the government. etc. aren't doing much.
On May 25th, 2020, George Floyd, a 46-year-old black man, died in Minneapolis, Minnesota after Derek Chauvin, a white police officer and 3 others, knelt on his neck for almost nine minutes while he was handcuffed face down in the street. Many people were watching but none of them did anything to help George Floyd because they were not powerful enough. This all happened because George Floyd was suspected of giving a counterfeit $20 bill. This makes me very sad because George Floyd did nothing to deserve this and black people are being treated like this every day just for having a dark skin color which is something they can't control. Black people are given stereotypes, if you're black you are a “thief”, a “killer” and many more racist stereotypes that have nothing to do with the color of someone's skin. Black people are being treated brutally and are being killed by white people who think they are the most superior race.
George Floyd, Sean Reed, Ahmaud Arbery, Eric Garner, Ariane McCree, Steven Demarco Taylor, Terrance Franklin,David McAtee, Natosha “Tony'' McDade,Yassin Mohamed, Kwame “KK'' Jones, Trayvon Martin, Tamir Rice, these are all names of unarmed blacks who were shot and killed by white supremacists, and there's even more but they are too many to name.
Dylann Roof Kills 9 and he is arrested peacefully, Patrick Crusis kills 28 and he is also arrested peacefully, but Eric Garner who Killed 0 people allegedly sold illegal cigarettes choked to death while stating “I can’t breathe”.George Floyd Killed 0 people, allegedly wrote a bad check murdered on camera.
The phrase ”All Lives Matter '' is a phrase used in response to “Black Lives Matter” but it does not represent the same thing. People say it and it is wrong, all lives don't matter until black lives do! You can't just say “all lives matter '' when it's black lives that are suffering. ‘Black lives matter’ doesn’t mean other lives don’t matter, it's just that right now black lives are the ones that are suffering the most and we should try our best to help them.
