But thanks to new media, information as well as real time images and videos of inhuman treatment of black people can now be globally seen, and timely as they happen, and the world is beginning to seriously ask insightful questions about the hypocrisy of a United America. This is churning the stomachs of some white people, who wished for the good old days when nobody heard nor saw what they did not want anybody to hear and see, and they are now trying to silence and quieten folks trying to throw light on a horrible experience. They are chorusing Black Lives Matter is racist, a blackmail of some sort, to see if anyone bites the bait to enable them shut Black Lives Matter down; but Icheoku says not this time. They did it with past black Americans attempt to bring to light their life situation in America, hunted people down, killed off some and ran many underground.
Icheoku says it is this mindset that led former cross-dressing Mayor of New York, a man whose political fortunes were waning until 9/11 gave him a booster shot in the arm and he shot back to some new relevance. Now Mayor Rudy Giulian had the effrontery to call BLM racists and you ask yourself what is racist about or in a group merely trying to draw attention to a people who have called America home for over 500 years still being regarded and treated as half humans and in some cases, worse than animals, not deserving of full rights as equal citizens of America and as enjoyed by their white counterparts?
Icheoku asks what is racist or wrong in human beings desiring to be accorded some honor, respect and every decency, deserving of rights as human beings? Moreso BLM is not disparaging other races nor asking that other races be made inferior or treated unfairly and are nor advocating that other lives do not matter. They are instead alerting Americans that their own lives should and do matter as well, period. The unofficial policy has over the years remained if no one hears about it, it does not exist; and now people are hearing it and shaming these pepertrators and they are beginning to complain.
Icheoku says all this anti-BLM will make sense if Giuliani could point to that aspect of life in America that is not racially tinged? And then by the same token, point to what BLM has done to make them racist? This makes it practically impossible for the police who are themselves products of a racist society to grow out of what they knew growing up and which is still prevalent in the society. The police are not saints nor were they descended from heaven and cannot simply be wished to be above the failings of human beings who are inherently biased. We all have our biases as we tend to treat our own more kindly than others, who we consider competitors that must be contained. So fighting back or pushing back this should not be regarded as racist; rather equality fighters, period.
Police violence and reactions to it is simply a reflection of two agitating opposites of an American society that is broiled in a storied racist past, which continues till today in one form or the other and another which is trying to improve the situation and make things better. A more embolden black youths have risen to organize themselves into activist pressure group, who are now poised to say enough is enough, not under their watch and not anymore; leading to the birth of Black Lives Matter. They are ready to point the searchlight on wrongs of the America society and their objective is to institute a level playing field for everybody's benefit. They want every American, regardless of their pigmentation to feel the bun of America; but has rejected and has refused to accept the statues-quo as the only possible option in America.
So as Giuliani tries to wax philosophical about what he knows in his heart of hearts to be untrue, that a people merely asking to be treated and respected as bona fide full citizens of the United States of America, are racists; Icheoku says only the truth will set everyone free. Black Lives Matter is not racist by any dint of imagination or interpretation of that word, but are merely contemporaneously demanding that other lives outside white lives should and do also matter. They just want to be included in the lives considered genuine and germane in America. They have reasons to despair and protest as continued subjugation is a fact of their lives in America and it cuts across the board.
It is not just the police that is being complained about by black Americans. It includes a justice system that is skewed against them with more convictions rates and longer prison terms. It includes a penal system that punishes lower black crimes more harshly than higher white crimes. It includes job opportunities thats not readily there. It includes their white counterpart getting probationary reprimands while they get mandatory prison terms just to stigmatize them. it includes punishing crack cocaine more harshly than snow white cocaine. It includes policies and economy that isolates blacks in certain deprived neighborhoods and communities. It extends and encompasses different areas of life in America without any exception; so the police is not the problem, the society is.
Icheoku's only prayer is that white Americans will not succeed in muscling and silencing this avenue of letting off steam; because if they do, no one knows what other outlet these black people might resort to. With what is happening in France, Belgium and other countries where their citizens are taking to terrorism and disturbing society's peace and cohesiveness, who knows what will become of America in the event black people are forced into such a desperate hateful situation. Icheoku hopes it will never get to that darkest point where black Americans will resort to terrorism to drive their point home. Any rational American will agree that protests is a much more preferred option than terrorism and every person or group of persons who wants to peacefully protest anything should freely do so without being branded racist.
It is an absurdity of a situation that several centuries after white people came to Africa and kidnapped the forebears of these black Americans from the jungles of Africa and forcibly shipped them to America to till their lands and water their crops, that they are still being segregated in their own communities, schools, jobs, neighborhoods, etc; and you wonder what then was achieved with all the civil rights acts as well as abolition. Black lives should matter as well or shouldn't they and why not? Instead of making amends and restitutions, these white people are doubling down and trying to paint BLM in bad light as a racist organization and you wonder how racist could an organization be that is simply asking to be respected and treated fairly? They did not say that other lives do not matter or should not matter or should be disregarded. So why give a dog a bad name just to hang it?
Icheoku says that 33 million black Americans might be too many people to either completely kill off or totally silenced? Also when one factors in that only about 3 million people are imprisoned in the United States of America, it becomes simply obsfucating proposition how Americans plan to house 33 million black Americans in prisons if that becomes the option. It will require increasing the current facilities and manpower ten fold to achieve the feat. Finally, choosing to kill them all off will not be that easy either nor will it be without consequences. This is no longer the fifties or way back in the days of slavery where the black man does not own weapons nor knew how to use them. If they feel hunted down and facing extinction in America, they will fight back. Like the Buffalo soldiers and Tuskegee airmen, they will stand their grounds and will also prove their mettle; and definitely will take a lot of white people along with them on their way out and as they make their exit from this world.
These scenarios are frighteningly unpalatable, so the better option is for both sides of the argument to tamper down their rhetorics and work out an acceptable middle of the road solution, instead of the very far positions each has assumed. Both should realize that we all are in it together and it is either we survive together or we perish together. There is no other acceptable way out. Instead of shouting at each other, we all should start talking and listening to one another. Instead of pointing accusatory fingers at each other, we all should start beckoning each other into a warm embrace. That way, it will be much easier to find out meeting grounds both as to how to palliate the hurting black Americans who are angry and also the scared white Americans who are afraid of losing it all.
That black Americans are hurting from experiences of the past which continues till this date is a fact. That white Americans are scared stiff that they are losing their country is equally a fact. To ignore either concerns is an unacceptable position for any of the sides to take or dismiss each other's fear as unfounded or none existent. But in any other event, white Americans must endeavor not to radicalize black Americans because keeping track of 33 million radicals or even terrorists might prove such a daunting task that will be too much to handle. There will be no greater enemy of America as we know it and which can successfully unravel it than a radicalized black American population, who having decided they have nothing to live for nor anything to lose, will go all out to register their displeasure.
In event of this unfortunate nightmarish situation ever evolving, America's downfall will accelerate faster than the Particles Accelerator in Switzerland. May God never allow the ever effervescing distrust to degenerate into that armageddon. May God help us all and may God keep his people safe and united; may God bless America, may God bless every American, including white people, black people, hispanic people, Asian people, native Americans, as well as every other people who call America home. If only Mayor Rudy Giuliani could rise above self and realize the gaffe he made and apologize for calling Black Lives Matter a racist organization, it will be a good starting point for the needed healing in America.
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