For years the answer given to claims about racism, hiring and pay discrepancies, and the like has been to assert that we need a colorblind society. The problem is that you cannot create a colorblind society with a nation that is so divided along racial lines. The effect of creating a colorblind society would be to ignore the stark inequality between the races.
This past year we have seen the emergence of the #BlackLivesMatter movement – the idea here is that black lives are not treated in huge sectors of society as equally valuable compared to white lives. Some have responded to #BlackLivesMatter activists by telling them that “all lives matter.”
The problem is that, while it is true that “all lives matter,” by making that statement we are ignoring the problems that have to be addressed in society.
As New York Times columnist Charles Blow put it this week, “When people respond to ‘Black Lives Matter’ with ‘All Lives Matter,’ it grates.” He explained, “All Lives Matter may be one’s personal position, but until this country values all lives equally, it is both reasonable and indeed necessary to specify the lives it seems to value less.”
An article in Fusion from July laid it out as clearly as anyone quoting an “Explain Like I’m 5” thread, where user GeekAesthete explained, clearly and succinctly, why changing #BlackLivesMatter to #AllLivesMatter is an act of erasure that makes lots of people cringe.
Imagine that you’re sitting down to dinner with your family, and while everyone else gets a serving of the meal, you don’t get any. So you say “I should get my fair share.” And as a direct response to this, your dad corrects you, saying, “everyone should get their fair share.” Now, that’s a wonderful sentiment — indeed, everyone should, and that was kinda your point in the first place: that you should be a part of everyone, and you should get your fair share also. However, dad’s smart-ass comment just dismissed you and didn’t solve the problem that you still haven’t gotten any!
The problem is that the statement “I should get my fair share” had an implicit “too” at the end: “I should get my fair share, too, just like everyone else.” But your dad’s response treated your statement as though you meant “only I should get my fair share,” which clearly was not your intention. As a result, his statement that “everyone should get their fair share,” while true, only served to ignore the problem you were trying to point out.
That’s the situation of the “black lives matter” movement. Culture, laws, the arts, religion, and everyone else repeatedly suggest that all lives should matter. Clearly, that message already abounds in our society.
The problem is that, in practice, the world doesn’t work that way. You see the film Nightcrawler? You know the part where Renee Russo tells Jake Gyllenhal that she doesn’t want footage of a black or latino person dying, she wants news stories about affluent white people being killed? That’s not made up out of whole cloth — there is a news bias toward stories that the majority of the audience (who are white) can identify with. So when a young black man gets killed (prior to the recent police shootings), it’s generally not considered “news,” while a middle-aged white woman being killed is treated as news. And to a large degree, that is accurate — young black men are killed in significantly disproportionate numbers, which is why we don’t treat it as anything new. But the result is that, societally, we don’t pay as much attention to certain people’s deaths as we do to others. So, currently, we don’t treat all lives as though they matter equally.
Just like asking dad for your fair share, the phrase “black lives matter” also has an implicit “too” at the end: it’s saying that black lives should also matter. But responding to this by saying “all lives matter” is willfully going back to ignoring the problem. It’s a way of dismissing the statement by falsely suggesting that it means “only black lives matter,” when that is obviously not the case. And so saying “all lives matter” as a direct response to “black lives matter” is essentially saying that we should just go back to ignoring the problem.
This is the core of the statement – the phrase “black lives matter” has an implicit “too” at the end, asserting that “black lives should also matter.” We get that “all lives matter” and are not stating otherwise, but it ignores the problem and gives us license to continue to ignore the problem.
We have had the debate over officer-involved shootings. My contention is: (A) our police kill too many people regardless of race; (B) we need to have cameras to assess whether the police are justified in individual cases; (C) we need to have better training for police officers to avoid killing people; and (D) there are racial components that are complicated by differentials in crime statistics that may themselves have racial components.
So we can rehash this argument again, or look to another area where we believe black lives matter (less) in the current system – sentencing. Since 1976, of the nearly 1700 executed, 78.67 percent of the people executed killed a white victim versus 14.2 percent who killed a black victim.
Or put another way, those who kill non-Latino whites are over three times more likely to be sentenced to die as those who kill African-Americans. Those who kill non-Latino whites are over four times more likely to be sentenced to die as those who kill Latinos.
Remember, most crimes are between members of the same race. So 80 percent of blacks are killed by blacks.
In California, African-Americans are six times more likely to be murdered than whites in California. While 27.6 percent of murder victims are white, 80 percent of executions in California have been for those convicted of killing whites.
Whether you believe in the death penalty or not, these statistics demonstrate the idea that black lives matter less than white lives when it comes to imposing the death penalty and executing the killer.
The reverse is also true – not only are people more likely to be sentenced to harsh penalties when the victim is white, people of color are more likely to be sentenced to longer sentences when convicted of similar crimes.
An ACLU report found, “Sentences imposed on Black males in the federal system are nearly 20 percent longer than those imposed on white males convicted of similar crimes.” They found, “The racial disparities increase with the severity of the sentence imposed.”
They continue, “These racial disparities result from disparate treatment of Blacks at every stage of the criminal justice system, including stops and searches, arrests, prosecutions and plea negotiations, trials, and sentencing. Race matters at all phases and aspects of the criminal process, including the quality of representation, the charging phase, and the availability of plea agreements, each of which impact whether juvenile and adult defendants face a potential LWOP sentence.”
One of the most interesting things the report found was the staggering racial disparities that exist in sentencing for nonviolent crimes, especially property crimes and drug offenses.
Based on data provided to the ACLU by the U.S. Sentencing Commission and states’ Departments of Corrections, the ACLU “estimates that nationwide, 65.4 percent of prisoners serving LWOP for nonviolent offenses are Black, 17.8 percent are white, and 15.7 percent are Latino.”
The BlackLivesMatter movement has arisen out of the need to address all of these sorts of issues. On their website they note, “We are broadening the conversation around state violence to include all of the ways in which Black people are intentionally left powerless at the hands of the state. We are talking about the ways in which Black lives are deprived of our basic human rights and dignity.”
These issues do not get addressed by asserting that “all lives matter” – they do, but the point of the movement is to highlight ways in which, in the functioning of our system, black lives matter less than other lives. An “all lives matter” assertion cannot address those discrepancies. It cannot address the issue of mass incarceration that has disproportionately impacted the lives of 2.8 million black people.
Quickly I want to respond to the other response: “Police Lives Matter.” It suffers from the same problem. It is all too evident that police lives matter in our system. We look at the few instances where police officers were successfully prosecuted for on-duty shootings and killings. Until recently there was a reluctance to charge police with crimes committed while on duty.
A crime committed against a police officer on duty results in special circumstances that makes it more likely to lead to the death penalty. Crimes against police officers often are charged more severely or carry their own enhancements.
Bottom line is that, in our system, police lives not only matter, they matter most. The last two death sentences in Yolo County went to Marco Topete who killed a sheriff’s deputy and Brendt Volarvich, who killed a highway patrol officer.
The evidence seems to lean toward the idea that police lives not only matter, they matter more in some respects than other lives. By the way, perhaps that is with at least some justification, given the job we ask them to do.
The bottom line here is that, by asserting “all lives matter” in response to a #BlackLivesMatter claim, we are not stating anything that anyone doesn’t already agree with. However, we are also not addressing the critical problem that led to this discussion in the first place.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
Well put, David. Thank you for illustrating one of the great deflections in American society, today. Something one of my bandmates said in response to this; “First thing is everybody has to listen and try to understand.”
Sadly, this becomes nearly impossible when all sides are inflamed by current events and circumstances.
;>)/
When will we talk about the 2,000 people killed every year by gangs instead of the George Soros funded “debate”?
When will we talk about the 30-40-50 million Americans who are so fearful of their safety from criminals and gang bangers, that they put metal bars on their windows and doors? Work your whole life to buy a home, condo, or have a modest apartment, and then have to put bars on them?
“When will we talk about the 2,000 people killed every year by gangs instead of the George Soros funded “debate”?”
Probably when you write the article.
If TBD, or anyone else, writes an article about a high interest subject and publishes it here, then there is no “probably” about it. People will definitely talk about that subject, especially a subject that affects 30-40-50 million Americans enough to be fearful of their safety.
So we must not chance stifling the #BlackLivesMatter movement with AllLivesMatter even though they shut down and stifle politician campaign speeches?
I don’t think that’s what I said.
BP – Still waiting to read your submission.
If we truly believe that black lives matter perhaps it would be more productive to look at some of the societal factors that lead blacks into lives of crime and gang activity?
How about talking about some of these issues:
* The breakdown of the traditional family. So many black kids growing up without good male role models to guide them.
* Too many young, impoverished, poorly educated girls having kids they can’t support properly.
* Popular culture that glorifies violence, crime, mistreatment of females, and “street culture”.
* Lack of parental guidance such as teaching black boys that it’s not OK to commit robbery and burglary or other crimes.
* Lack of parental guidance in stressing the importance of education. Where are the “tiger moms” of the black community? (I’m sure there are some, but not many)
These are some of the real problems that are being ignored in the discussion.
Bingo. These and…
– Crappy schools
– Crappy economic opportunity
It is very clear what is going on here. Based on what the media and politicians (really the same) comment on and don’t comment on, there is a desperate attempt to steer the narrative away from the needed debate about failed liberal policies and to something more politically-convenient to blame on.
“BlackLivesMatter” is a stupid and destructive tag line. It perpetuates a mindset of groupism and racial separation.
What matters is socioeconomic conditions, economic opportunity, culture, and community and family values.
Other than those charlatans enriching themselves over racial division, rank and file liberals and blacks are simply stuck in a victim mentality that is manipulated by the former in the game of identity politics. In that game the narrative is formed to label good and bad actors. And in the liberal lexicon the traditional bad actors are conservatives, whites, CEOs, corporations. But the false veneer of these labels was starting to fray. Hence the creative idea to add law enforcement as a new target of blame.
But the truth is that law enforcement workers are also victims of the decades of failed liberal policies. Because they are left having to help clean up the mess caused.
All lives matter, and it is not until we reject the media-political games being played, and start doing true introspective root-cause analysis and demand effective solutions to fight those problems… that we will successfully achieve the next level of civil rights progress that we should hope for.
The true root causes are decades of failed liberal policies and thinking that keeps too many blacks locked into a life of government dependency and low economic circumstances. Fix that and we fix the problems of black over-representation in crime and punishment.
Frankly: The true root causes are decades of failed liberal policies and thinking that keeps too many blacks locked into a life of government dependency and low economic circumstances. Fix that and we fix the problems of black over-representation in crime and punishment.
Here’s a recent example of a “liberal” policy of busing that was ended for schools in a predominantly black neighborhood of Tampa-St. Petersburg area of Florida in 2007 and their schools got worse. What’s your conservative spin on this? Seems like the previous “liberal” policy of integration was a better solution than what came later:
Tampa Bay Times, 8/14/15: One fateful decision. Years of neglect. Five once-average schools remade into the worst in Florida. FAILURE FACTORIES
“All lives matter” is a truism used to deny and obscure the reality that racial discrimination and injustice are still among the foremost social issues of our time–much the way “states’ rights” was used in the past as a euphemism to perpetuate segregation.
Another empty catch phrase to divert attention from the failure of conservatives to offer viable, concrete solutions rather than dismissive attacks, victim blaming, and useless generalities.
Isn’t it really the result of failed conservative policies?
If you think about it, the civil rights movement was in full swing by the 1950s and 60s. Did the conservative movement embrace the civil rights movement? Some Republicans certainly voted for reform, but even in the 1950s and 1960s, William F. Buckley who is probably the intellectual leader of the conservative movement was taking the south’s side in the National Review. Nixon won in 1968 based on “lawlessness” which was a code word for “black crime” and then cemented the Republican majority through the southern strategy which disengaged on segregation but hit up things like crime, affirmative action, drug, welfare – the stage was set for a series of policies that would put blacks into a “New Jim Crow” through mass incarceration, the war on drugs. It ended a bipartsan chance to do some sort of reconcilliation like what would happen in South Africa and so the two parties have been on opposite sides on what to do, and subsequently little has gotten done.
The old tired left wing “code word” theory at work again.
Where do you think it came from? Nixon.
“Under Richard Nixon, the GOP’s “Southern Strategy” aimed to ensure it by systematically making veiled (and often not-so-veiled) racist appeals to white voters. “From now on,” Nixon aide Kevin Phillips told him, “the Republicans are never going to get more than 10 to 20 percent of the Negro vote, and they don’t need any more than that.””
So “lawlessness” is a code word for black crime, “thug” is a racist code word for a black man, if you work for California one can no longer say “alien”, if Obama gets “angry” one has to say he’s more aggressive instead out of fear of being accused of using code for “an angry black man”, etc.
Liberals are so full of themselves.
You did something very interesting in your first sentence: “So “lawlessness” is a code word for black crime.” You changed the tense from “was” to “is”. I was referring to something that Nixon did in the 1960s, you’ve changed it to something ongoing. My claim wasn’t that current usage of “lawlessness” is a code word for black crime, that it was in the 1960s and early 1970s as Nixon was implementing the Southern Strategy.
Topcat: How about talking about some of these issues:
* The breakdown of the traditional family. So many black kids growing up without good male role models to guide them.
* Too many young, impoverished, poorly educated girls having kids they can’t support properly.etc.
* Lack of parental guidance in stressing the importance of education. etc.
These are some of the real problems that are being ignored in the discussion.
Okay. Put us on the right track then. What do you suggest?
“Too many young, impoverished, poorly educated girls having kids they can’t support properly…”
Young men participate in the pregnancy in the first place. The young woman is not the only one responsible for having a baby.
As for the rest of your comment, I agree with most of it.
Topcat
I believe that there are many ( including those on the left) who are certainly attempting to address some of these issues. I will take the one that I know the best to illustrate.
“Too many young, impoverished, poorly educated girls having kids they can’t support properly…”
On this we have agreement. So from my perspective the question is “what can be done to help with this issue ?”. The clear answer for me is to provide education and health care including a full range of contraceptive and family planning services at locations convenient to the women in question at prices they can afford. This is what Planned Parenthood does. It goes into those less than desirable neighborhoods described by Holly O’Donnell and provides the full range of services needed by these women. And what has been the response from those on the right ? Well, they are busy attempting to defund and ultimately destroy the major group providing these services. Do they have an alternative ? Not that I have seen proposed.
From my perspective, problem solving involves looking at our own behaviors and seeing what we, personally have to contribute to solving the problem. What is rarely helpful is sitting back, pointing fingers at the behavior of other individuals and pretending that “it is all their fault”. Change always begins with “what can I do that would make a difference?”. So right now, there is something that each of us could do that is real, concrete, and could make a real difference in the life of one of these vulnerable young women you have accurately characterized. That would be to support Planned Parenthood in providing for these young women the same services that we have available for us, for our mothers, wives, daughters…and yes….all their male counterparts since we only see Planned Parenthood as a female issue since we have chosen, as a society, to define family planning as a “woman’s issue” thus relieving men of their 50% of the responsibility for a child “from the time of conception”.
So here is my suggestion. If you truly want to help this population, write a letter to congressional leaders, make a telephone call, sign a support petition, and donate to Planned Parenthood. These are the folks who are actually doing something to address this particular issues, sometimes at great personal risk. Let’s support them.
I don’t care what the Vanguard says, the ACLU says, or any other activist organization says.
All Lives Matter.
As I said, all lives do matter, but that doesn’t get to the heart of the concerns.
All Lives Matter and it’s going to keep being stated, whether the left likes it or not.
Yeah, BP, go for the ‘tag-lines’, make the world left/right, spout your angst, and we do not move to solve problems. If, and where they exist.
That’s your right, but it’s not a conversation and won’t produce a solution.
I’m off on the left and also believe that all lives matter, but that is not an appropriate response to black lives matter when black lives clearly mean less to a significant segment of the non-black community.
Which “concerns”? ‘Black’ community? ‘Latino community’? White bi-polar young adult community? Homeless community (whatever race)? ETC.
Just because there is one set of problems/ concerns, doesn’t exclude others.
Seems like the ‘Black” (or other racial) issue(s) are the ones you’ve focussed on, David. To the basic exclusion of others, at least recently. Get more “hits”, more revenues by stirring that particular issue? Even the AIM/GATE postings you’ve done tend to focus on race/ethnicity.
“I don’t care what the Vanguard says, the ACLU says…”
No surprise there. Hope you never need the services of the wonderful ACLU.
The “wonderful ACLU” in all its fairness hardly, if ever, represents conservative causes.
BP
The “wonderful ACLU” in all its fairness hardly, if ever, represents conservative causes.
This is inaccurate. The ACLU has represented a very wide range of conservative causes. A quick Google search of “ACLU and conservative causes” resulted in hundreds ( possibly thousands but I didn’t keep reading ) of cases in which the ACLU has defended groups such as gun rights advocates, American Nazis, the KKK, the Westboro Baptist Church, multiple right wing Christian groups, to give a few of the examples that people may recognize.
Plus there are a whole host of issues where the far left and far right agree – government use of data, expanding spying powers, etc.
Like I said, they hardly if ever take on conservative causes. That’s why the ACLU is known as the Anti Conservative Liberals Union.
BP, what civil liberties cause would you want the ACLU to represent?
As Tia pointed out in her list below, the list of conservative causes they have represented is not insignificant. What civil liberties cause would you add that isn’t there?
— Gun rights advocates,
— American Nazis,
— the KKK,
— the Westboro Baptist Church,
— multiple right wing Christian groups,
hpierce
I would like to point out that David covers the issues of importance to David. The Planned Parenthood accusations would not have been covered had I not written the series of articles. Don cared enough to write an article on his view of the Gate/Aim controversy. A prominent conservative blogger has written several articles on his/her view of impacts of various policies on our local economy. We have and guest writers submit articles on numbers food, transportation and environmental topics.
“Get more “hits”, more revenues by stirring that particular issue?” ?
This seems a bit unnecessary to me given that I know that you know the Vanguard editorial policy on submissions since you have commented on it previously. I will however repeat the options for those who may not know.
If any subscriber or reader of the Vanguard wants a particular issue covered there are three good routes to achieve this :
1. Write the article yourself
2. Find someone like minded and knowledgeable on the topic to write an article.
3. Propose a specific topic and your view of its relevance to our area and one of us might be willing to take it on. Some of the articles that I have written have been suggested by others, not original topic ideas of mine.
For the most part, I think local land use stuff probably generates the most interest, followed by local controversies and then so heated national issues. I write on issues like race and the police because it interests me. I have done a lot of work in the community on these issues as well, but I learned a long time ago, almost at the start, that we had to have a broader scope to draw in a mass audience.
I’m fine with “Black Lives Matter”–the statement doesn’t exclude that other lives matter as well, but it serves to focus attention on the black community, and is a statement that most blacks and whites (I would hope) can agree on.
Just wish the black community would choose more clear-cut anecdotes than Ferguson to rally around (clearer anecdotes do exist), and also acknowledge that excessive use of force by police impacts poor whites and hispanics as well, and is a particularly problem for blacks because such a high percentage of blacks are poor–by acknowledging these types of problems impact poor whites and hispanics as well, movements such as “black lives matter” might gain more support from whites and hispanics instead of alienating them.
Statistics such as those pasted below (from above article) need to be qualified in order to demonstrate systemic bias:
“Since 1976, of the nearly 1700 executed, 78.67 percent of the people executed killed a white victim versus 14.2 percent who killed a black victim.”
Were some of the killings in self-defense or non-negligent accidents, and thus not crimes? For killings that were crimes, need to break down into manslaughter, 1st, 2nd, and 3rd degree murders–also, special circumstances (kidnapping, torture/mutilation, forcible rape, other heinous depravities). Priors? Presumably most of the executions were for those convicted of 1st degree murder, either with priors or special circumstances; not sure how relevant ‘killings’ is, since most killings are not first-degree murder.
“Sentences imposed on Black males in the federal system are nearly 20 percent longer than those imposed on white males convicted of similar crimes.”
Again what are the priors and criminal history?
I’m ready to acknowledge systematic racial bias may exist (or have existed); but such important qualifiers need to be included to further break down the data to allow controlled direct comparisons, with all significant qualifiers in sentencing accounted for.
P.S. I do agree that alternatives to prison (or shorter prison sentences with longer parole/monitoring periods) should be sought for many non-violent offenses; and would support such proposed legislation.
“shorter prison sentences with longer parole/monitoring periods…”
This could be a start but the jail/prison system is broken almost beyond repair, so shorter sentences (for non-violent offenders) will help, but rehab/quality mental health treatment before and during incarceration is what’s necessary, and jobs when folks get out.
My knee jerk embarrassing gut reactions the first time I heard “Black Lives Matter” were, “Yeah, that’s so true.” Then, “but wait a minute, what about women’s lives?” Then I realized the two aren’t exclusive.
sisterhood
“Then I realized the two aren’t exclusive.”
And with that, you gave me my first smile of the morning.
It will only be when we realize that someone else having the comfortable life that we take for granted, does not mean that we are in any way threatened but in fact that we will be strengthened by them also having enough to live comfortably, will we end the falsely dichotomous views of our society that we have constructed.
BP
“they hardly if ever take on conservative causes”
I am confused. Your claim is unclear to me. In view of my post, it could be interpreted in a number of different ways.
1. You do not believe that the ACLU has defended any of the groups that I cited.
2. You do not believe that this defense represents a significant amount of the cases they take and are just exaggerating with the words “hardly ever”.
3. You do not believe that gun ownership rights, avowedly right wing Christian groups, the advocation of information privacy , and other individual civil rights protections are “conservative causes”.
Or maybe I am missing some point that you have not elucidated in your re statement of your claim. Can you help me understand your position ?
*Black Lives Matter; Take Pride In Parenting; End Our National Epidemic of Child Abuse and Neglect*
Speaking At The Eulogy For The Honorable Reverend Clementa Pinckney, President Barack Obama said:
*”Perhaps it causes us to examine what we’re doing to cause some of our children to hate.”* (Applause.)
With all due respect to Ms. Patrisse Cullors, her colleagues and supporters of the Black Lives Matter movement, I believe she would better serve all Americans if she were to honestly, openly and compassionately address the *National Epidemic of Child Abuse and Neglect* that for decades has deprived untold numbers of depressed children from experiencing and enjoying a safe, fairly happy American kid childhood.
I’d respectfully suggest she share a conversation with Grammy winner Kendrick Lamar and learn why he has been suffering from depression for most of his childhood and adult life.
#RestorePrideInParenting
#EndChildAbuseNeglect
#ProtectKidsFromIrresponsibleCaregivers