Ignorance Kills

I think that one of the most fundamental reasons in regards to misunderstandings on the issue of race and systemic injustice is a lack of education. I once heard Cornel West say that “at the heart of racism is ignorance.” I think it is ignorance that is responsible for those with lighter skin complexion to lack empathy for those with a darker skin complexion. I think it is ignorance that leads people to post and agree with this Peanut’s cartoon:

I think this comic represents the ignorance of every racist American Christian I’ve spoken with in the past two years. What this Peanut cartoon is suggesting, or rather the way in which it was used on my Facebook feed, is that a privileged person being called racist is of equal moral harm to a person shooting an unarmed person because of their darker skin complexion. That’s ignorant.

I believe there to be a wide spread false assumption that the protesting in #Ferguson is only representative of Michael Brown and his experience with police officer Darren Wilson. If that is an assumption of some, it must be said that it’s an incorrect assumption. Ferguson is representative of the experiences in which the oppressed experience daily.

This is representative of:

Kimani Gray, Kendrec McDade, Amadou Diallo, Ousmane Zongo, Timothy Stansbury, Jr., Sean Bell, Orlando Barlow, Aaron Campbell, Ronald Madison and James Brissette, Oscar Grant. Just in the month of august: Eric Garner, John Crawford, Ezell Ford and Dante Parker. 

Ferguson represent all of the listed names above, and the names not listed above. They represent the men lynched for whistling at a white women. They represent the extermination of native America. They represent the ghettoization of black America. They represent any and/or everyone that has been pillaged by a systemic racism. They represent the execution of a nine year old, in which no one noticed.

Furthermore, this cartoon silences the voices acknowledging the staggering 1 million black male population that makes up almost half of the total 2.3 million incarcerated population [*]. If this present trends continue, one in three black males born in the states can expect to spend time in prison during his lifetime.

The call of Christianity is to see beyond oneself. This cartoon shows a misunderstanding of Christianity and our call to see beyond ourselves. To empathize with the other, to share compassion and mercy with the downtrodden. Never have I read in the bible that you’re meant to direct attention towards your hurt feelings in times of mass murder, incarceration, and injustice.

This revolution should be educated. This revolution will not be nice, and in the same way this revolution, or any revolution for this matter, should not be selfish [**].

[*] White Americans are incarcerated at nearly six times the rate of blacks…

[**] This is not a call for violence.