I recently met an Episcopal priest who uses the slogan, “All lives won’t matter until #Black Lives Matter.” That statement should throw some explanatory light on the term and the movement, #BlackLivesMatter, at least for those persons who earnestly wonder about singling out black lives for emphasis.
As it happens I have seen an even better explanation. It occurred on a recent protest sign held by a young black woman participating in the London protests against the killing of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile by policemen in the United States. It said simply, “Yes, all lives matter but we are focused on the black ones because it is very apparent that our judicial system does not know this.” As the brother on the street corner would say, “‘Nuff said!”
It should be readily apparent that racial injustice is occurring when we reflect on the current rate of killings of unarmed black persons by police officers. By “unarmed” I mean not brandishing a deadly weapon. Although I hate the fact, laws in many states permit open carry of firearms, so just having a firearm and not wielding it should not be much different from not having any firearm. And of course policing should occur in the context of the legal situation.
According to several sources, including the Mapping Police Violence website, unarmed black individuals were killed by police at five times the rate of unarmed whites in 2015. Police killed at least 102 unarmed black people in 2015 and in only 10 of the 102 cases were officers charged for a crime, and in only two of the deaths were officers convicted. These rates of successful prosecutions are lower than when one civilian kills another.
As I see it, saying black lives matter is basically saying black lives should mater; however, these data clearly say “not yet.”