Black SOULutions

Understanding the deep and troubled history in this country, speaking upon police brutality is a crucial topic that needs to be addressed. The Black community has always had a strained relationship with the police that has been damaged for more than 50 years; and given the uproar within our community from the unacceptable treatment and genocide of our peoples by the police, in order to fully address the brutality we face from police, we must stop comparing black on black crimes to police brutality — it is a distraction and does nothing to help the fight.

Black lives matter has nothing to do with black on black crimes

We constantly see people saying, “Why don’t I ever see Black Lives Matter speak upon black on black crimes.” Why?  When focusing on black on black crime it is an ILLUSION given the simple fact that intra-racial crime (i.e. black on black, latino on latino, white on white, etc.) exists for ALL races; and in actuality, according to a report by Amren.com the highest percentage of intra-racial crime is within the white diaspora.

Relating back to Black Lives Matter, this movement was created to oppose and resist police brutality given the awareness that the high number of police killings every year mostly consists of black male or female victims. The hashtag #BLM went viral and struck a core with many people.  There are several organizations that address different issues, but many people only know Black Lives Matter. Before speaking on the movement understand what is and why it was created

There are other organizations that specifically address violence in the inner city communities

Black Lives Matter is not the only organization people should know about, there are other organizations  out there that specifically address crimes within our community.  If those very people who bring up black on black crime did their research, they would know that there are people and organizations that are specifically targeting and fighting against black on black crime. If those people really cared about black on black crime (Kevin Gates) they would give platforms to organizations that address the issues instead of speaking down on an entire movement (BLM) that is targeting a much different issue (Police Brutality on black lives!). Further, people love using Chicago as an example of black on black crime but as Roland Martin says, “If you used google, it would be your best friend.”  Here are a few of the many organizations out in Chicago addressing inner city violence:

• A Safe Haven
• Becoming a Man
• Blair Holt Peace Alliance
• Build Chicago
• CeaseFire Illinois 

It’s not about whites shooting black men, it’s about police shooting black men & getting away with it

Kevin Gates and many others have used the argument, “a black man kills a black man, no one cares. A white man kills a black man and y’all go crazy.” Him and many other people are misinformed — it is NOT about whites killing blacks. It is about police officers murdering black men at a higher rate than any other race and getting away with it. In order to exemplify this point, The Washington post stated:

“According to the most recent census data, there are nearly 160 million more white people in America than there are black people. White people make up roughly 62 percent of the U.S. population but only about 49 percent of those who are killed by police officers. African Americans, however, account for 24 percent of those fatally shot and killed by the police despite being just 13 percent of the U.S. population. As The Post noted in a new analysis published last week, that means black Americans are 2.5 times as likely as white Americans to be shot and killed by police officers. U.S. police officers have shot and killed the exact same number of unarmed white people as they have unarmed black people: 50 each. But because the white population is approximately five times larger than the black population, that means unarmed black Americans were five times as likely as unarmed white Americans to be shot and killed by a police officer.”

Further, according to the Mapping Police Violence organization, “Only 10 of the 102 cases in 2015 where an unarmed black person was killed by police resulted in officer(s) being charged with a crime”. This is why we are angry, they kill us and get away with it most times, we kill each other and there’s a major chance we will get convicted and put away.

End the comparisons
Now that we have been educated on this issue, please stop bringing up black on black crimes when a cop unjustly kills a black man. This is incredibly distracting, dividing and you make no sense in doing so.