What is Black Lives Matter?

ODESIA HOWLETT

Black Lives Matter (BLM) is an organization, a movement, and a rally cry.

BLM - Canada was co-founded in 2014 by Janaya Khan and Yusra Ali.

“Black Lives Matter - Canada is the Canadian chapter of #BlackLivesMatter, an international organization and movement fighting police state violence and anti-Black racism,” the organization’s website states.

Its parent organization, co-founded in 2013 in the U.S. by Patrisse Cullors, Alicia Garza, and Opal Tometi , unified millions and spread to Canada and the United Kingdom with the goal of dismantling any and all forms of anti-Black racism, affirming Black existence, and fighting for justice. BLM is an organization created as a response to centuries of oppression.

Many people are seeing the resurgence of the BLM movement due to what happened to George Floyd, a Black man who was killed by a Minneapolis police officer who knelt on Floyd’s neck for nearly nine minutes.

However, many injustices have happened in Canada this year, including the deaths of D’andre Campbell, Eishia Hudson, Jason Collins, Chantel Moore, and Ejaz Ahmed Choudry.

Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour (BIPOC) community members have suffered an extensive history of murder and oppression, including here in Canada, and this has led many activists to begin demanding for police services to be defunded and abolished completely. They believe funding should be reallocated to community-based programs and education to be able to bring biases and discrimination to the forefront in order to work through and overcome racist ideologies.

Above all else, BLM is a unifying idea that all Black lives are worthy of respect and dignity on par with white lives. It’s not that only Black lives matter, but rather that Black lives matter too. With protests and rallies taking place all over the world, “Black Lives Matter” is used as a definitive statement, a plea, and an acknowledgement of the oppression of millions.

All kinds of Black people need to be respected. Black women, Black trans folks, Black queer people, Black people with disabilities, Black people experiencing poverty, Black people who didn’t get a post-secondary education, and all other intersecting marginalised communities deserve to be respected.

I am a Black woman, and this past few months, I've grown more and more aware of the significance of my Blackness. It’s time to listen to Black voices when we say we deserve more. The BLM movement gives us the chance to be more than another statistic of police brutality.

Say their names: George Floyd, D’andre Campbell, Eishia Hudson, Jason Collins, Chantel Moore, Ejaz Ahmed Choudry.