The Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement, since its founding, has held firm to the claim that it fights for equality, against police brutality, and various other issues that effect the black community. While tensions between the police and general public have been at an all time high, it has only enhanced the problem created by this movement. While we don’t disagree with anybody’s right to protest, what the movement has done exceeds what is constitutionally protected. rioting, looting, systematic targeting of innocent pedestrians, just to name a few of the deeds conducted by this group.
Riots and destruction
In what should have been a peaceful protest, we have seen various crimes. Some of these, if done by any other group, would had been deemed terroristic. However, somehow or another, this group has somehow bypassed charges of this severity. This isn’t to say that arrests have not been made. In Portland, the nation watched as BLM protestors, alongside a terroristic group, ANTIFA, burned countless vehicles and businesses to the ground. In this regard, their protest consisted of destroying the lives of innocent people, potentially living from paycheck to paycheck, simply because they could. However, this is just the starting point for their nefarious crimes.
Harassment and violence
While the BLM movement continues to complain about how they’re being “treated,” we are going to look at the hypocrisy of their actions. First, as BLM would say, let’s “say their names” as we review those victimized by the BLM movement. Recently, we have the two Louisville officers who were gunned down during a BLM “protest.” Thankfully, these officers are expected to make a full recovery. However, the list doesn’t end there. Canon Hinnant, a 5(yo) child, was cruelly murdered in front of his siblings as he simply rode his bike. Of course, BLM defended this going as far as to say, “The neighbor was defending his life.” If that sounds insane, that’s because you are an individual capable of rational thought. But the list of deaths doesn’t end there. In Iowa City, 22 year old, Italia Marie Kelly, was randomly gunned down as she left a protest; she was one of two fatalities During this specific protest. Five other white people were beaten by the BLM protestors simply for being white.
Moving away from murder victims, we look into random, unprovoked, harassment. In various videos, circulating the internet, we see BLM protestors harass various people as they eat. While there appears to be no provocation, it doesn’t stop these protestors from attempting to provoke an unnecessary fight. In other instances, we see these protestors, who claim to want to bring awareness to their cause, target journalists.
While bringing awareness to their cause would be a great idea, it is impossible when protestors target any journalist who isn’t black. In doing so, they have done a wonderful job of preventing this. When attempting to cover the protests, journalists are often aggressively confronted, berated, called racist (a go-to claim for the movement,) having umbrellas pushed into their face, and so fourth. For a group wanting to bring awareness, it appears that they are only bringing awareness to the fact that they are a hate group. To make matters worst, they are a hate group shrouding itself as a group fighting for equality.
Social viewpoints change/conclusion
Because of the actions of BLM, we have seen a shift in public opinion. As of recently, reports have begun to flood the internet discussing how the movement is losing popularity within the public eye. According to recent stats, BLM is most popular with the democratic party. Breaking things down, we find that they are most popular with the age group of 18-34. In the educational region, they are ironically most popular with post-grads. In the racial area, they are only popular within the black community, lacking any popularity in any other race. While there are many explanations for why the stats, which can be viewed here, it could be as simple as how they behave. Generally, burning down entire neighborhoods, targeting people of other races, and targeting journalists all while screaming the “victim card,” doesn’t fair well with most people.
The movement was one that held much potential. Rather than utilizing that potential, they have instead thrown away any accomplishments they could have achieved. Fighting hatred with hatred has shown, in history, to never be an effective measure. Rather than bringing the very thing they sought, unity, BLM has instead created more tension than what existed previously. Perhaps, they should evaluate how they conduct their protests, take measures in preventing these things, and actually fighting for what they claim to seek. Of course, as history has also shown, this is unlikely to happen.
