What you mean by black lives matter

Newsround

3 Jul 2020 3 July 2020

You may have heard lots of people using the phrase ‘Black Lives Matter’ in recent times.

It’s a statement which has become an important way for people to show their support for members of the black community who have experienced discrimination simply because of the colour of their skin.

‘Black Lives Matter’ has become an important statement phrase for many following the death of an African-American man called George Floyd, But it was first used widely back in 2013 after a teenage boy called Trayvon Martin was killed by a neighbourhood watch volunteer who did not face any punishment.

Nobody involved in the Black Lives Matter movement is saying that only black lives matter, or that all lives don’t matter, or that white lives don’t matter.

Lots of people took part in protests following Trayvon’s death and many turned to social media to speak out against what had happened.

They felt upset about the injustice that was taking place in America and wanted to express their anger that that the lives of black people did not have the same value as other people’s lives. This led to the birth of the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter.

Since then, as well as a phrase of support, Black Lives Matter has grown into a campaigning organisation too.

Ged Grebby is the chief executive of the charity Show Racism The Red Card, he told Newsround that the Black Lives Matter movement was established in reaction to black people in the US being over three times more likely than white people to be killed by a police officer, according to figures published by the American Journal of Public Health.

«It is a movement for equality and against racism» he said.

The police brutality that was happening made black people feel «their lives simply did not matter» says ex-footballer and honorary president of Show Racism The Red Card, Shaka Hislop.

What Black Lives Matter Means (and Why It’s Problematic to Say «All Lives Matter»)

Saying that black lives matter doesn’t mean that other lives do not.

As protests against racist police brutality sweep across the United States and spread around the globe, rallying cries of «Black Lives Matter» echo through our streets and our digital avenues. As we all digest the news and think about how to respond and participate at such a pivotal time, it’s important to recognize what Black Lives Matter really means — as well as why the phrase «All Lives Matter» is problematic.

At its face, «All Lives Matter» sounds like a we’re-all-in-this-together statement. Some may be using the phrase to suggest that all races should join hands and stand together against racism, which is a sentiment that comes from a good place. But the problem is, the phrase actually takes the focus away from those who need it. Saying «All Lives Matter» redirects the attention from Black lives, who are the ones in peril.

Instead, it’s important to understand what drives the BLM movement and how to support it — by using the phrase and standing behind what it means. It can be an uncomfortable experience for many of us, especially if you’re someone that hasn’t taken the time to grapple with your own role in the systemic oppression that exists in our society. But it’s also an essential education, no matter where you are in your journey.

What Does Black Lives Matter Mean?

Black Lives Matter is an anthem, a slogan, a hashtag, and a straightforward statement of fact. While it is not a new movement, the message is central to the nationwide protests happening right now. BLM speaks out against the police brutality and systemic racism that caused the recent deaths of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, Tony McDade and Breonna Taylor, as well as the thousands of violent incidents that happen to Black people that aren’t recorded, aren’t reported or aren’t afforded the outrage they deserve. At its most basic level, it calls for a shift in the statistics that Black people are twice as likely to be killed by a police officer while unarmed, compared to a white individual. According to a 2015 study, African Americans died at the hands of police at a rate of 7.2 per million, while whites were killed at a rate of 2.9 per million.

#BlackLivesMatter
the next time u wanna say «all lives matter*» understand what the movement is actually about pic.twitter.com/t6PiY32uc7

How Did Black Lives Matter Start?

While racism in the United States goes back hundreds of years to the country’s founding, the Black Lives Matter timeline started much more recently. The movement arose out of the acquittal of George Zimmerman after he killed Trayvon Martin in 2013. Today, the Black Lives Matter Foundation, Inc. is a global organization that’s active in the U.S., U.K., and Canada, although it has supporters all over the world.

The BLM guiding principles are to eradicate white supremacy and intervene in violence inflicted on Black communities through advocacy, fundraising and education. The organization aims to combat and counteract violence, amplify Black innovation, and center Black joy.

Why It’s Missing the Point to Say «All Lives Matter»

While the intention of the phrase «All Lives Matter» may be to put everyone’s life on equal footing and convey a sense of unity, responding «All Lives Matter» to «Black Lives Matter» is actually more divisive than unifying. That’s because it discounts and diminishes the focus on the violence and discrimination Black individuals face every day in this country.

If you break your arm and go to the doctor, and the doctor says “all your bones matter, not just your arm.” You’re gonna look at them stupid because yes, all your bones matter but they are fine, your arm needs attention rn.
BLM is that arm, saying all lives matter is redundant.

It’s a natural reaction to respond to one group centering its experience with, «But what about all lives?» or «Isn’t my safety important, too?» But the truth is, Black Americans are disproportionately impacted by police violence and systematic racism in our nation. Our entire social structure centers around whiteness as a default. Asserting that «All Lives Matter» just reaffirms — or at best ignores — that reality. Of course every life is valuable, but not everyone’s lives are in danger due to their skin color. Saying «Black Lives Matter» isn’t equivalent to saying other lives don’t, but rather that Black lives should matter as much as white lives.

saying #AllLivesMatter is like running through a cancer fundraiser & saying «THERE’S OTHER DISEASES TOO»

Alicia Garza, one of the creators of the #BlackLivesMatter hashtag, explained in 2014 how Black lives mattering is a precondition for all lives mattering:

«Black Lives Matter doesn’t mean your life isn’t important – it means that Black lives, which are seen as without value within White supremacy, are important to your liberation. Given the disproportionate impact state violence has on Black lives, we understand that when Black people in this country get free, the benefits will be wide-reaching and transformative for society as a whole. When we are able to end the hyper-criminalization and sexualization of Black people and end the poverty, control and surveillance of Black people, every single person in this world has a better shot at getting and staying free. When Black people get free, everybody gets free.»

Think of it this way: If you get into a car crash and one person has a serious head injury but the others have a few bumps and bruises, the person whose life is at risk gets first priority when it comes to medical care. That doesn’t mean paramedics won’t help the rest of the passengers, but that triage places the most dire situation first in line. Or, to look at it another way, if someone keeps setting your house on fire, you’d want firefighters to do something about it. Wouldn’t it upset you if instead, people kept telling you that «all houses matter equally,» if yours was the one burning?

Why Black Lives Matter Still Matters

For those of us who are invested in working toward equality for all people, it’s important not to only see color, but to work on leveling the playing field. It’s a sad reality that the Black experience in America isn’t the same as non-Black experiences, in both seemingly small and incredibly large ways. If you’ve bought adhesive bandages, pantyhose, or foundation, you know what the default color range is. Many workplaces and schools still prohibit natural hairstyles or look at them as less «professional.»

How to Get Involved

The first step to combating racism in our society is listening, no matter who you are. It hurts to hear that you might hold prejudice, especially if you consider yourself an open-minded person. But instead of getting defensive or jumping in to explain your own perspective immediately, listen to other points of view including those of Black change-makers, elected officials, celebrities, friends and coworkers. Push back on prejudice in your own social circles, even if it requires awkward conversations. And educate yourself on your own inherent bias, even if you don’t think you hold any. Vote in your state and national elections to help enact change on a wider platform. And support racial justice organizations monetarily if you can, and share their messages on social media so others can get the information, too.

“Follow the lead of black leadership and your own local city and your state,» BLM co-founder and chair of Reform L.A. Jails Patrisse Cullors told Nightline. She listed Dignity and Power Now and the Youth Justice Coalition as places to start. “Those are just a few organizations that help in these moments when we have people who are upset and [in] pain, angry, grieving,» she added. “There’s hundreds of thousands of more organizations across the country.”

We can all work together to dismantle the racial bias that underpins virtually every aspect of our country and world. It’s hard work. It’s uncomfortable. But nothing worth doing is easy. There’s nothing more important than creating a world in which our children don’t have to be afraid to walk through an unfamiliar neighborhood, to go birdwatching, to buy a bag of Skittles, to browse in a high-end store, or even ask a police officer for help, no matter the color of their skin.

Black Lives Matter

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Black Lives Matter (BLM), international social movement, formed in the United States in 2013, dedicated to fighting racism and anti-Black violence, especially in the form of police brutality. The name Black Lives Matter signals condemnation of the unjust killings of Black people by police (Black people are far more likely to be killed by police in the United States than white people) and the demand that society value the lives and humanity of Black people as much as it values the lives and humanity of white people.

BLM activists have held large and influential protests in cities across the United States as well as internationally. A decentralized grassroots movement, Black Lives Matter is led by activists in local chapters who organize their own campaigns and programs. The chapters are affiliated with the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation, a nonprofit civil rights organization that is active in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom.

Early history: Trayvon Martin shooting

BLM was cofounded in 2013 as an online movement (using the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter on social media) by three Black community organizers—Patrisse Khan-Cullors, Alicia Garza, and Opal Tometi. They formed BLM after George Zimmerman, a man of German and Peruvian descent, was acquitted on charges stemming from his fatal shooting of Trayvon Martin, an unarmed Black teenager, in Sanford, Florida, in February 2012. Zimmerman, a neighbourhood-watch volunteer, had seen Martin walking in his neighbourhood and called the police because he thought Martin looked “suspicious.” Although Zimmerman was told not to do anything, he followed Martin, got into an argument with him, and shot and killed him. When law enforcement arrived, Zimmerman claimed that he had been assaulted by Martin and fired in self-defense.

Zimmerman remained free for weeks, but, as the shooting gained national attention, demonstrations demanding his prosecution were held in cities across the United States. He was finally charged with second-degree murder and arrested in April 2012. At his trial more than a year later, Zimmerman claimed that he had acted in self-defense, citing a controversial Florida law known as “stand your ground.” His acquittal in July 2013 was widely perceived as a miscarriage of justice and led to further nationwide protests.

Why You Need to Stop Saying «All Lives Matter»

Let me be clear: stating that black lives matter doesn’t insinuate that other lives don’t.

Black lives did not matter when they were inhumanely transported like livestock from Africa. Black lives did not matter when they were lynched by the hundreds at the hands of the KKK. Black lives did not matter when they were attacked by dogs as they protested for equal rights.

With the weekly news cycle seeming to, without fail, include the death of at least one black boy at the hands of the police, or the body of a black woman being thrown to the ground by local law enforcement, or a black child being manhandled by the services meant to protect them, my heart sinks as I cling to the desire that black lives will matter.

When Nancy Pelosi, as part of MSNBC’s town hall last year, was asked by student Shelly Ward if she supported the Black Lives Matter movement, Pelosi’s response was an all too familiar “Well, I believe that all lives matter”. Her statement was to the very obvious disappointment of the young black woman who asked the question, and to the disappointment of an exhausted black community.

Speaker Pelosi on Black Lives Matter:

«I support the recognition that black lives matter, for sure, and I have incorporated that in many of my statements. All lives matter. we really have to redress past grievances in terms of how we addressed the African-American community.» pic.twitter.com/igbCqyceIJ

Anyone who has kept any type of pulse on civil rights and the black human condition in the United States since the transatlantic slave trade would understand the need to emphasize the protection of black bodies. The people who have had the luxury of ignoring this particular issue is the white community, which has had the privilege of not questioning—on a large scale—whether the systems they live in are detrimental to their livelihoods, based on their skin color.

But as the Black Lives Matter movement emerged, they were all of a sudden jolted into an awareness of the intersection of race and surviving police encounters. Instead of exploring the reasons why a movement like this would even be necessary, many have a knee jerk reaction. “What about me?” “All lives matter,” they cry. “Why be divisive and unfair, what about our safety?” The point these people miss is that the majority of experiences here in America already tend to center and highlight whiteness and cater to its safety. The country was built to function that way. Its roots of white supremacy and the marginalized concern for people of color has remained.

Today, looking at the gross brutality and murders of black American citizens like Oscar Grant, Michelle Cusseaux, Samuel Dubose, and Jordan Edwards, w e are still aspiring to convince you that black lives matter.

But let’s get back to the issue of countering Black Lives Matter with the phrase “All Lives Matter.” I’ve come to describe this as a collective gaslighting from the white community. Gaslighting is a tactic in which a person or entity, in order to gain more power (or in this case, keep their own peace), makes a victim question their reality. Why do those who counter black lives matter act as though black people aren’t aware of the glaring disproportionate statistics of police brutality, of health care racism, and of mass incarceration? This is our reality. You deciding to ignore it for your own comfort doesn’t make it any less true.

If a patient being rushed to the ER after an accident were to point to their mangled leg and say, “This is what matters right now,” and the doctor saw the scrapes and bruises of other areas and countered, “but all of you matters,” wouldn’t there be a question as to why he doesn’t show urgency in aiding that what is most at risk? At a community fundraiser for a decaying local library, you would never see a mob of people from the next city over show up angry and offended yelling, “All libraries matter!”—especially when theirs is already well-funded.

This is because there is a fundamental understanding that when the parts of society with the most pain and lack of protection are cared for, the whole system benefits. For some reason, the community of white America would rather adjust the blinders they’ve set against racism, instead of confront it, so that the country can move forward toward a true nation of justice for all.

«Stating ‘black lives matter’ doesn’t insinuate that other lives don’t.»

Let me be clear: our stating that black lives matter doesn’t insinuate that other lives don’t. Of course all lives matter. That doesn’t even need to be said. But the fact that white people get so upset about the term black lives matter is proof that nothing can center the wellbeing and livelihoods of black bodies without white people assuming it is to their demise.

My personal message to those committed to saying “all lives matter” in the midst of the justice-driven work of the Black Lives Matter movement: prove it. Point out the ways our society—particularly the systems set in place to protect citizens like police officers and doctors and elected officials—are showing up to serve and protect black lives. Illuminate the instances in which the livelihood of the black community was prioritized, considering the circumstances that put us into less-privileged spaces to begin with. Direct me to the evidence of justice for the bodies discarded at the hands of those in power, be it by unjustified murder, jail cell, poisoned water, or medical discrimination.

These are the things that must be rectified for us to be able to exhale. Until then, I’ll be here, my black fist raised with Black Lives Matter on my lips.

Why you should stop saying “all lives matter,” explained in 9 different ways

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It’s a common conversation these days: One person says, “Black lives matter.” Then another responds, “No, all lives matter.”

It’s also a complete misunderstanding of what the phrase “black lives matter” means. The person on the receiving end interprets the phrase as “black lives matter more than any other lives.”

But the point of Black Lives Matter isn’t to suggest that black lives should be or are more important than all other lives. Instead, it’s simply pointing out that black people’s lives are relatively undervalued in the US — and more likely to be ended by police — and the country needs to recognize that inequity to bring an end to it.

To this end, a better way to understand Black Lives Matter is by looking at its driving phrase as “black lives matter, too.” So all lives do matter, obviously, but it’s one subset of lives in particular that’s currently undervalued in America.

But if that isn’t good enough, here are nine other ways the response “all lives matter” has been rebuked.

1) “All houses matter”

2) A Reddit user’s explanation

3) “All plates matter”

4) “There are other diseases too”

Do people who change #BlackLivesMatter to #AllLivesMatter run thru a cancer fundraiser going «THERE ARE OTHER DISEASES TOO»

5) “I too have felt loss”

WTF is the impulse behind changing #BlackLivesMatter to #AllLivesMatter. Do you crash strangers’ funerals shouting I TOO HAVE FELT LOSS

6) A Unitarian Universalist minister’s explanation to a church member

Of course all lives matter. Central to Unitarian Universalism is the affirmation of the inherent worth and dignity of every person. Sadly, our society has a long history of treating some people as less valuable than others. Study after study has confirmed that in equivalent situations, African Americans and Latinos are treated with deadly force far more often than White people, and authorities held less accountable. Unfortunately, racial bias continues to exist even when it is no longer conscious—this too is confirmed by multiple studies. A lack of accountability in the use of force combined with unconscious bias is too often a deadly combination – and one that could place police officers, as well as the public, in great danger.

To say that Black lives matter is not to say that other lives do not; indeed, it is quite the reverse—it is to recognize that all lives do matter, and to acknowledge that African Americans are often targeted unfairly (witness the number of African Americans accosted daily for no reason other than walking through a White neighborhood—including some, like young Trayvon Martin, who lost their lives) and that our society is not yet so advanced as to have become truly color blind. This means that many people of goodwill face the hard task of recognizing that these societal ills continue to exist, and that White privilege continues to exist, even though we wish it didn’t and would not have asked for it. I certainly agree that no loving God would judge anyone by skin color.

As a White man, I have never been followed by security in a department store, or been stopped by police for driving through a neighborhood in which I didn’t live. My African American friends have, almost to a person, had these experiences. Some have been through incidents that were far worse. I owe it to the ideal that we share, the ideal that all lives matter, to take their experiences seriously and listen to what they are saying. To deny the truth of these experiences because they make me uncomfortable would be to place my comfort above the safety of others, and I cannot do that.

I very much appreciate you writing to me, and am glad that we share the goal of coming to a day when people will not be judged, consciously or unconsciously, on the basis of their race. I believe that day is possible, too, but that it will take a great deal of work to get there. That work begins by listening to one another, and listening especially to the voices of those who have the least power in society. If nothing else is clear from the past few weeks, it is painfully evident that a great many people do not believe that they are treated fairly. Healing begins by listening to those voices and stories.

7) A simple video explainer

#BlackLivesMatter
the next time u wanna say «all lives matter*» understand what the movement is actually about pic.twitter.com/t6PiY32uc7

8) A law professor’s response to a student

9) “If all lives matter … prove it!”

If all lives matter. SHOW US. Prove it! Show us our bodies hold the same value. There is no excuse for the slaughter. None.