Walnut Hills High School
Volume CX, Issue 1
Friday, September 11, 2015
Black lives matter: hashtagging history
PHOTO COURTESY OF http://www.anticapitalistes.net/spip.php?article5020
Protesters rallying behind a #Blacklivesmatter banner. There were many protests in the name of Black Lives Matter, some of them leading to violence and crime. Ibrahim Munir, ‘19 Matthew Youkilis, ‘19 On July 13, 2013, Alicia Garza was sitting in a bar with some of her friends. She stared at the TV in shocked horror as she saw the headline that George Zimmerman had been acquitted in the murder case of Trayvon Martin. Martin, an unarmed black teenager, had been killed on February 26, 2012, during Zimmerman’s neighborhood watch duty. She first checked social media, where she was astonished to see that many people were not condemning Zimmerman, but blaming African Americans for the condition they were in. Through her rage and anguish, she wrote a note on Facebook, encouraging people to realize that black lives matter. And so began The Black Lives Matter Movement, a campaign which has symbolized the fight against police brutality and racial discrimination since the Trayvon Martin shooting. It has grown over the last two years, sparking national outcry and demanding media attention. After Garza’s post, a hashtag was created by Patrisse Cullors, a friend of Garza’s. Embodying all of people’s animosity, grief, love and hope into just a three-word hashtag, it became an Internet phenomenon, being used all over the world. A little over one year later on August 9, 2014, a Ferguson, Missouri police officer Darren Wilson was responding to a call in the early afternoon when he confronted an unarmed African American teenager, Michael Brown. He had been caught on video stealing cigarettes from a convenience store earlier that day. Although disagreeing on the details, witnesses concur that Brown
ran away from the police car but turned around and was fatally shot. After months of deliberation, the St. Louis County Grand Jury decided not to indict Darren Wilson in Brown’s death. This new shooting ignited the Black Lives Matter Movement even further, with many protestfilled days and nights leading up to the Grand Jury’s announcement. After the announcement, Ferguson erupted in major riots with gunfire, vandalism, and car burnings, which incited the police to use tear gas and make many arrests. Over the course of the following year, Ferguson remained in a fragile state as the Black Lives Matter Movement intensified across the nation. Eric Garner was strangled by a New York Police Department cop; Freddie Gray died in the back of a police van in Baltimore; Sandra Bland committed suicide just three days after being humiliated and arrested by a police officer in Texas. Each was followed by major protests all over the country, raising even more awareness of the issue. Then on June 17 there was a shooting in which nine people were murdered at a historic African American church in South Carolina, leading many African Americans to believe that they are not safe anywhere, including SENIOR Torin Davis who argued, “At this point, black people aren’t safe anywhere...because we’re getting shot up in our churches now, our place of worship.” This shows why the Black Lives Matter Movement has developed with such urgency and has been a critical issue for many people everywhere. On July 19th, 2015, Sam Dubose was shot by University of
Cincinnati police officer Ray Tensing. Tensing stopped him on the grounds of a missing front license plate. He shot him after, claiming that Dubose’s vehicle had dragged him and that he “feared for his life.” Two days later, a peaceful rally took place on the U.C. campus,
the-Rhine, including involvement from students at Walnut. Although the Black Lives Matter Movement is fairly recent, Cincinnati experienced riots ver 10 years. In 2001, Timothy Thomas, an unarmed 19-year-old African American, was shot while being put under arrest for non-violent misdemeanors. Protesters were angered by his death and rioted. These riots were the largest urban disturbance in the United States since the 1992 Los Angeles riots. They consisted of burning and looting, followed by an economic boycott, and eventually a federal intervention. Today, riots have been handled differently in Cincinnati; they are not as violent and are now peaceful protests which voice the opinion of multiple citizens. The Cincinnati Police Department is now regularly held up as a model for how to improve police-community relationships. After the Black Lives Matter Movement reached Cincinnati, multiple students of Walnut Hills became involved with the Black
“All lives matter... If a life is lost, it matters, no matter the skin color.” - Jerron Gray where protesters wanted to know why Dubose had been wrongly shot and wanted the body camera footage. A week later, activists from the Black Lives Matter movement, friends and family held a demonstration and marched on U.C.’s campus. This incident in Cincinnati caused many protests in Over-
Lives Matter movement. SENIOR Torin Davis believes in self-defense for African Americans and has protested in Atlanta and New Orleans. He believes that African Americans “should arm themselves” because the police “are profiling the black man.” He also believes that the movement will play a significant role in the 2016 election, but that none of the candidates have fully approached the topic, and wants “a real black activist.” The Sam Dubose incident also affected him personally because Dubose was a cousin of Davis, which has led him to believe in self-defence. Assistant Principal Jerron Gray, however, has a different attitude towards the Black Lives Matter Movement. He believes that the movement is “necessary to bring awareness to issues around the country related to African Americans being stopped by the police.” His opinion, however, is that “all lives matter” and that “if [a] life is lost, it matters, no matter the skin color.”
PHOTO COURTESY OF Jamele Bouie
Memorial to Michael Brown. Brown was a victim of police brutality and was shot and killed on August 9th, 2014.