The Innocent yet Dead Why?‪?‬

WE MUST CONFRONT OUR PAST AND THE REALITY OF THE PRESENT
The disproportionate killing of black people is not a new phenomenon. Even
though it was not until 1991 when the first public beating – post-civil rights era –
was captured on camera ((Rodney King), the historical evidence of public harming
and devaluing of black bodies dates to enslavement, and was reinforced in the
19th century when lynching laws were in place. In a lot of ways, police brutality
against black people mirrors lynching. Today blacks, Latinos, and Native
Americans are disproportionately killed by the police should come as no surprise
given that policing in the U.S. has its origins in the mission to conquer Native
Americans and then to prevent enslaved Africans from fleeing.
No matter how uncomfortable it makes us feel, we should frame police brutality
against people of color as a structural racism and white supremacy problem. It is
not simply the fault of individual ill-intentioned, racist, power-hungry, authority-
abusing officers. It goes much further and deeper than that.
Time to stop the rotation in search of an answer that really lies in a
preventable cause of death. One that makes us all uncomfortable to address –
racism.