So You Have a Problem With "Black Lives Matter"?

Why is there so much onus on the Black Community to do more to clean up its neighborhoods when we don't own most of where we live or are given equal opportunity? That same expectation isn't put on White Communities. Our taxes pay for lawful protection too but we get government terrorism and police brutality too often instead. When we say "Black Lives Matter" a chorus of folks jump up in opposition to say, "All Lives Matter." If so, then why don't they also stand up against the injustices done to Black People as part of the "ALL"?

I see folks going after the Black Lives Matter movement to address all the crime in the Black Community and I once agreed with their point to an extent, but have since changed my position. What is missed or ignored by the critics is all the current civil unrest brought on by the continuous killing of Black Men by police officers, and no fairness of justice being given even when the incident is caught on camera. I mean, even 25-years after the "Rodney King" taped beating by LAPD officers, who were subsequently acquitted, and which led to the L.A. Riots we're still that dumb?! 

Let's get something straight; "Black Lives Matter" is not an actual organization but was begun as a rallying cry that became a hashtag during the time of Trayvon Martin's murder to speak out against the murders of unarmed Black men by police officers and private white citizens like George Zimmerman, for which they don't face justice. It's still not an official organization but the movement has now been infiltrated by non-Black outside entities offering "financial help" to insert their own agendas which have pretty much ruined the potential of what it could be. An "idea" or rally cry doesn't need an organization but it only needs participation from those who believe in it and aren't corrupted by the opportunity to benefit from it personally. When I hear other Black people criticize "Black Lives Matter" now I must question their amnesia on all the atrocities of this country's government against the Black Community, Native Americans, Hispanic, and Asians that are conveniently ignored:

How did you erase the mass enslavement of Black People from nearly the entire West African coast to build this country? How do you forget the displacement and slaughter of the Native Americans who are now diminished to living on "reservations" of their own land? How do you ignore the ugly history of race riots that murdered entire communities of Black or Poor People such as "Black Wall Street", Rosewood, and the aerial bombing of a poor Philadelphia, PA neighborhood? How do you brush off the "Zoot Suit Riots" against Mexicans in Los Angeles, CA? How do you overlook the indentured servitude or "railroad slavery" inflicted on Chinese immigrants to help build the Trans-Continental railroad? How do you not know about the mass reversal of lawful gains by Blacks after the Civil War during the period of "Reconstruction" to our deconstruction with over 100-years of "Jim Crow" laws as the second phase of slavery that also brought peonage, slave like share cropping practices, the free reign of the KKK for the first part of the last century, and unto the indiscriminate killings and mass incarcerations of Black men in disproportionate numbers today? 

How are we suppose to get over "slavery" with a growing laundry list of blatant social and physical abuse done to us during slavery and ever since?! The "Black Lives Matter" movement didn't create the history behind the issues in the Black Community that we're currently facing or contribute to the issues themselves as they are. They are addressing a very pressing issue within it that is being created from the white power structure without it that is further exasperating all other issues. It's unreasonable to blame a movement that sprang up because of blatant injustice against Black People and also expect them to clean up or address all the crime too. Folks don't even expect that much out of Superman or other fictional superheroes. While all of this is going on in our nation many of these same critics are determined to stay critical, aloof, uninvolved, or super spiritual while throwing rocks from behind their smug glass castle walls. Let me ask you, What are you doing about addressing crime in the Black Community all this time instead of addressing the "Black Lives Matter" movement about it? 

The Black Community's buying power is purposely restricted to also limit our access to ownership, and the government is on record for targeting us to bring in illegal drugs & guns to help create the drug problems and accompanying crime issues. You can't clean up a mess of 400-years of oppression if you can't get the resources to do it; especially when you didn't cause them by yourself. A Black drug dealer is always on the lower end of the drug deal no matter how prominent they become. They can only distribute to the areas they're given. We don't own the production of the drugs nor the transportation that brings them in from Central & South America, the Far East, Eastern Europe, and also the Middle East. That's a government "connect" doing that, and we've never had that on the ongoing basis with which we see drugs flood across our borders. We've only been the "fall guys" and "scapegoats" to take the blame for it. Black Lives Matter regardless of if there is crime in our neighborhoods or not, and it doesn't change the fact that racist or over aggressive police officers are taking Black lives at a disproportionate rate 2.5 times greater than that of whites who are armed with guns! 

What about the criminals hiding behind government jobs who help cause and continue these issues? They get a pass? When I hear politicians talk about how bad certain neighborhoods are I always wonder what have they done to help improve it? How many times did they block much needed funds to our communities and funnel them elsewhere? How many times did they vote down measures that would make our streets safer and our schools better, or give police officers better screening and training so we don't get the trigger happy ones who want to be in our neighborhoods because they say, "That's where the action is!?"  Our neighborhoods are approached with the gleeful expectation and desire for trouble as if police officers are going to an amusement park named "Niggerland" to make all their abusive fantasies come true. They can kill, rape, harass, physically abuse, and rob without consequence even when caught on video with eye witnesses to confirm the evidence.

If you hate Black People then there is no better job than to be a police officer where you can shoot them, choke them, beat them freely, rape them, harass them and get an early pension for it. That's a sadist wet dream for which the poor screening and hiring practices of local police forces all over the country make into a reality, but into a nightmare for those policed by them. There was a time when both Black people along with White people who couldn't admit to their bigotry did practically the same thing, and it happened about 50-years ago during the Civil Rights struggles of the 1960s. They celebrate MLK now and even revere Malcolm X but many of these same folks also were their biggest critics and afraid to get involved or show any kind of support. They instead only sought what was wrong with these leaders and the movements they were a part of as critics. Let's try something different... if you want to "just pray" or observe without doing anything then "just pray" or observe, continue not doing anything, AND BE QUIET. HUSH! It's just a suggestion, but a very good one. ~ I.J. West