Students Hold Discussion at Out of the Box: Black Lives Matter
By Vincent Ottomanelli
On Wednesday Catholic University’s Out of the Box hosted a discussion about the Black Lives Matter movement focusing on issues such as how the Black Lives Matter movement is being influenced by and portrayed by the media, how it is progressing, and how it can successfully reach out to different groups about what it advocates.
In the wake of the controversy and confusion surrounding cases such as those of Trayvon Martin and Eric Garner, both black males who were killed while unarmed while seeming to have received inadequate legal reaction, the Black Lives Matter movement emerged to address these issues with the hopes of bring about real change. The movement is also inspired by other issues concerning the black community, such as inconsistencies between the black and white races in terms of employment, drug arrests, and sentencing.
The event hosted a small discussion group, in which participants brought forward different concerns about the status of black Americans, as well as that of other ethnic minorities, race relations, and policies that can be a remedy for these problems.
One major issue that was discussed was how law enforcement disproportionately arrests black people as well as other minority groups, because black people tend to live in poorer neighborhoods where drug law enforcement is concentrated. Also mentioned was how this issue relates to mandatory minimum sentences, the privatization of prisons, and the war on drugs itself, which disproportionately affects black people and undermines civil liberties.
The way in which the Black Lives Matter movement is perceived by mass media and by society also became a major topic of debate at the event. One commentator brought up how she encounters people in her everyday life who are completely ignorant to many issues facing the black community, and who have the privilege of not knowing about institutional racism and the true meaning behind the phrase “Black Lives Matter.” This particular slogan is controversial, because to some it seems to disregard the lives of non-black people, and suggests that black people are persecuted in particular, which they may not believe to be true. In contrast, the movement exists to protect the lives of black people who are not treated equally, and who need a movement for their protection. “The phrase all lives matter actually undermines the movement, because it suggests that there is no problem,” said another speaker.
Another big conversation during the event was how the movement has been able to reach out to different people to bring about changes successfully, and how it has been less successful. For example, one student mentioned how “one of the shortcomings of the movement so far is that it has failed to present a specific list of policy changes it advocates.”
One way in which local government has responded to complaints about police brutality and disproportionate arrests is by requiring police officers to wear body cameras while on duty, the idea being to discourage such abuses by providing the authorities with evidence to prosecute in the case of an abuse.
Several cities such as Baltimore and Minneapolis have equipped officers with body cameras. In many cases the legal process seems to unfairly favor law enforcement, and how in certain cases such as with Eric Garner and Freddie Gray, the law enforcement officers involved seemed to not face a fair legal response. As a result, this is another major concern of the Black Lives Matter movement.
To solve this problem, the discussion focused on using body cameras to provide evidence as well as to stop abuses in the first place, as well as for the movement to take its fight for justice to the courts and to the voting booth.
