Does the name Trayvon Martin ring a bell? Of course it does. That’s how all this started. He was the one who attacked George Zimmerman, the “white Hispanic” of antagonist lore, and had been pummeling his head against the sidewalk MMA-style before the latter shot him in self-defense. Zimmerman had reported the hoodie-donned Martin to police after witnessing him casing houses (Martin had previously been caught at school in possession of stolen jewelry and burglary tools, and was currently on his third suspension).
Remember Michael Brown, the 6’4″ behemoth who strong arm burglarized a store clerk before violently attacking police officer Darren Wilson and trying to steal his gun? Wilson shot him in justified self-defense, and it is from this altercation that the entirely fictitious “hands up, don’t shoot” twaddle arose.
Remember Eric Garner, the cigarette hawker with over thirty prior arrests? Remember Breonna Taylor, who was deeply involved in her boyfriend’s drug trade? Remember Jacob Blake, the domestic abuser who attacked police with a knife while trying to kidnap his girlfriend’s child? Remember Eric Logan, the car burglar who likewise came at police with a knife? Remember Alton Sterling, who fought police before pulling a gun on them?
And who could forget the martyrdom of St. George Floyd, who once robbed two women and a child at gunpoint in their home, and whose fentanyl-induced death triggered riots and deaths across the fruited plain?
These incidents were trumpeted by Black Lives Matter and their media eunuchs as incontestable evidence of systemic, anti-black racism at the core of America’s icy heart, though a single shred of actual evidence has yet to be presented that these incidents had anything to do with race. The mere fact that negative altercations arise between members of differing races is nowhere near “evidence” enough to credibly suspect racism.
But even if that’s your honest suspicion, one deduces quickly that these aforementioned “victims” are not exactly modern day Emmett Tills. Nonetheless, these criminals were eulogized as “gentle giants.” Their grade school pictures were posted. Matriarchal laments were heard about how they always wanted to grow up to be astronauts and brain surgeons. Starbucks employees donned activist t-shirts. “Communities” came together to grieve and to resist. Voices were amplified. Murals were painted. Streets were renamed. People were empowered. And police were defunded.
So how’s that been workin’ out? Are these criminals truly the inspiration for contemporary black America? Is someone of George Floyd’s character who black parents want their sons to emulate? Their daughters to marry? You’re selling yourself short, my friends. Your forefathers’ generations produced Crispus Attucks, Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, Harriet Beecher Stowe, George Washington Carver, Claudette Colvin, and Martin Luther King. Your generation produced Colin Kaepernick, Lizzo, Brandon Johnson, Nikole Hannah-Jones, Jussie Smollett, Cardi B, and LeBron James. The force with which your forefathers currently spin in their graves could generate enough kinetic energy to rotate a planet.
President Obama famously quipped, “If I had a son, he’d look like Trayvon.” Yeah? And if you had a son, would he behave like Trayvon? Because his actions, not his race, were the sole determinant in effecting his demise. To the extent that his appearance played a role, it was his meticulously maintained “gangsta” mien that attracted negative attention. But that negative attention was intentionally sought. Martin wanted people to see him as a dangerous thug. And that’s the problem, not any imaginary racism on the part of his fellow citizens who viewed Martin in exactly the manner in which he wanted to be viewed. Had it not been Zimmerman pulling the trigger, it would have been a rival drug dealer or gang member, and the world would never have heard of Martin.
The majority of all our problems, be they individual problems or community problems, are largely of our own making. The desire to assign blame to outside, conspiratorial forces is understandable, but counterproductive. It is true that part of the blame for the plight of the black community does fall onto the politicians who have fed them truckloads of lies since the advent of LBJ’s Great Society. But much of the blame falls onto the community itself. Because, by now, it is beyond obvious that the street corner elixir salesman to whom you’ve freely given over half a century of voting loyalty have absolutely no intention of allowing you a reprise from your political serfdom. That you keep voting for them, in lockstep and without question, is your fault and only your fault.
Fool me one election, shame on you. Fool me fifty elections, shame on me.
It speaks to these politicians’ depravity that they engage in the basest of pandering and racial huckstering. But it speaks to their voters’ obstinance that they sell their children’s futures to line up to hear exactly what they want to hear, while in the unspoken knowledge that, on some fundamental level, they must know it’s all inane drivel. To that extent, black egos matter more than black lives.
Oh, and your white “allies” who attend and march in the rallies? Their participation is driven solely by their enormous sense of arrogance, narcissism, and self-righteousness. To that extent, white egos matter more than black lives.
It also attests to the political reality that, whether or not its proponents actually believe that black lives matter, they certainly don’t think they matter more than political leverage. If black lives mattered, the activist class wouldn’t be focused on avenging the supposed wrongs done to the drug dealers, the domestic abusers, the deadbeat dads…in short, the absolute worst offenders plaguing their own communities.
Here are some black lives whose tragic demises garnered absolutely zero protests, lawsuits, murals, raised fists, renamed streets, federal investigations, or barista propaganda:
DAVID DORN
Dorn was the retired St. Louis police captain who was murdered while trying to defend a pawn shop from looters. He had spent his 38-year career mentoring young people.
LA DAVID JOHNSON
Johnson was a special forces operator who had been deployed to Niger to fight an ISIS offshoot group. His undertrained and ill-equipped team were ambushed at the village of Tongo Tongo. Johnson went down fighting heroically against Islamic terrorists.
DELANO WELLS JR.
Wells witnessed his younger sister being attacked and beaten by thugs in the hallway of their apartment building. He jumped in to save her, and was shot and killed by the attackers.
MIOSOTIS FAMILIA
Familia was a police officer who had been sitting in her vehicle when a repeat felon approached and assassinated her, shooting her in the head at point blank range. She was the mother of three children.
WILLIAM RIVERS – KENNEDY SANDERS – BREONNA MOFFETT
These Americans were the three soldiers killed last month in the drone attack on our military base by Iranian-backed militants. We had troops in Jordan? Who knew? Clearly the Iranians did, even if the American public didn’t.
If black lives mattered, these would be the household names whose lives we celebrate and whose deaths we honor. But black lives don’t matter to Black Lives Matter if those black lives were lost defending their communities, their families, and their country. Black Lives Matter lionizes only those who seemed to have been doing everything to destroy their communities, their families, and their country.
This is because the Black Lives Matter movement’s stated aims are the dismantling of Western society, the eradication of capitalism, and the destruction of the nuclear family. To this end, the movement opposes any social or cultural reforms that would actually rehabilitate downtrodden black communities. It is in their interests to keep black America poor, angry, and hopeless.
Activists in the black community can continue peddling the known falsehoods of their naked emperors, or they could support the idea that all black lives matter. But they can’t do both.