In Martin Luther King, Jr.’s famous, “I Have a Dream,” speech, he envisioned “a dream that one day right there in Alabama little black boys and little black girls [would] be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers” (personal communication, 1963). This speech was spoken during a time of segregation and discrimination between White’s and African Americans within the United States. Despite the passage of the Emancipation Proclamation, White’s still sought to disenfranchise African Americans due to the color of their skin and the ignorant belief that Whites were the superior race. Oppression of all forms were enacted in order to keep African Americans “in their place” and to ensure that White’s reaped all
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Similar to the social workers who were groundbreaking in establishing and sustaining the NAACP, yet were completely stripped of any credit, the BLM is doing the same wrong to the African American queer women who created it. Cullors, Garza, and Tometi insisted on creating a movement that was based on intersectionality and included all African American lives, not just fighting for police violence against cisgender African American males. Garza insists BLM “is a unique contribution that goes beyond extrajudicial killings of Black people by police and vigilantes. [BLM] affirms the lives of Black queer and trans folks, disabled folks, Black-undocumented folks, folks with records, women and all Black lives along the gender spectrum” (Jackson). The media and political institutions that surround society also exclude intersectionality of African Americans-varying sexual orientations, genders, and abilities-through their overrepresentation and incitation of police-on-black crime. Movies and television shows perpetuate racial stereotypes, such as the African American male who is constantly up to no good, involved in crime or gangs, unintelligent, and has low socioeconomic status. This puts young African American males at risk for stereotype threats, or conforming to these negative stereotypes about themselves. “The corporate media, for its part, consistently presents police brutality and extrajudicial killing as crises primarily for black men” (Rickford, pg. 39). Due to this, political and societal institutions use prejudice towards minorities based on what they see in the media, for they typically have had no other interaction with them. This is how police-on-black crime is kept on the forefront of African American issues despite the growing need for attention to black queer and transgender individuals as well as African American
Similar to the social workers who were groundbreaking in establishing and sustaining the NAACP, yet were completely stripped of any credit, the BLM is doing the same wrong to the African American queer women who created it. Cullors, Garza, and Tometi insisted on creating a movement that was based on intersectionality and included all African American lives, not just fighting for police violence against cisgender African American males. Garza insists BLM “is a unique contribution that goes beyond extrajudicial killings of Black people by police and vigilantes. [BLM] affirms the lives of Black queer and trans folks, disabled folks, Black-undocumented folks, folks with records, women and all Black lives along the gender spectrum” (Jackson). The media and political institutions that surround society also exclude intersectionality of African Americans-varying sexual orientations, genders, and abilities-through their overrepresentation and incitation of police-on-black crime. Movies and television shows perpetuate racial stereotypes, such as the African American male who is constantly up to no good, involved in crime or gangs, unintelligent, and has low socioeconomic status. This puts young African American males at risk for stereotype threats, or conforming to these negative stereotypes about themselves. “The corporate media, for its part, consistently presents police brutality and extrajudicial killing as crises primarily for black men” (Rickford, pg. 39). Due to this, political and societal institutions use prejudice towards minorities based on what they see in the media, for they typically have had no other interaction with them. This is how police-on-black crime is kept on the forefront of African American issues despite the growing need for attention to black queer and transgender individuals as well as African American