Black Lives DO Matter
That’s Why MY Life Matters
That’s Why MY Life Matters
Since the murder of George Floyd at the hands of four police officers in Minneapolis, Minnesota on May 25, 2020, there have been hundreds of protest marches worldwide (and some looting and rioting — not the same thing), as well as many perfunctory “We support #BlackLivesMatter” written missives from companies seeking to show that they at least seem to be non-racist and that they certainly are supporting their Black employees.
I have been self-employed since 2008, and although I have three companies and five different business units, I am my companies since I am a solopreneur. Those who know me personally, or those who have worked with me as clients or collaborators, or those who simply follow me on my various social media outlets already know how I feel and where I stand. I did not feel it was necessary for me to issue a separate statement about my companies, because my companies are me.
So this story that is related to the recent protests will be different.
The History of Black Lives Matter
Black Lives Matter (BLM) is an organized movement dedicated to non-violent civil disobedience in protest against police brutality. The broader movement and its related organizations typically advocate against police violence towards black people, as well as for various other policy changes considered to be related to black liberation.
Black Lives Matter started as the social media hashtag #BlackLivesMatter after George Zimmerman was acquitted of the murder of Trayvon Martin in February 2012. The originators of the hashtag and the resulting calls to action, Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi, expanded their project in 2014 after the deaths of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, and Eric Garner in New York City, both at the hands of police. Demonstrations expanded as recent deaths of unarmed Black men, women, and children by police in recent years also grew exponentially, and the project reached nationwide status with over 30 local chapters by 2016. However, the Black Lives Matter movement itself is decentralized and has no formal hierarchy.
Since the end of the Civil War, tens of thousands of Black people have been murdered by lynchings, bombings of churches and homes, shooting of guns and rifles, chokeholds, dragging behind trucks, hangings in jail cells, and every other manner of killing people. Many of the deaths were because Black people were attempting to exercise their rights as Americans, especially voting rights or integrating schools or neighborhoods, but especially recently, many Black people were killed while doing ordinary activities such as reaching for their ID, selling loose cigarettes outside of stores (with permission), playing on equipment in a park, shopping in a store, making a turn without using their car blinker, or playing music too loudly in their car.
After the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25, 2020, the Black Lives Movement and related marches and demonstrations have grown nationally and internationally, to bring awareness to police brutality and unfair legal practices that disproportionally target Black people and other people of color. Although there were some incidences of rioting and looting, for the most part, the marches have been peaceful and have spread from major cities to small towns and other rural areas.
My Family’s American Black Lives Have Mattered for Centuries
Racist Americans of European descent often scream at Black people to “go back to Africa!” What those people often do not realize is that Africans have been in the country since before it was a country, including coming here across the Atlantic Ocean centuries before Columbus, being part of the crew for Christopher Columbus and others, and coming here as indentured servants in 1619 before being transitioned to slavery. The very first person killed in the American Revolution, Crispus Attucks, was purported to be of African and Indigenous ethnicity.
The oldest paternal ancestor for which we have written verification is Rev. Thomas Pleasant Hilliard, my great-grandfather, an itinerant preacher who was born about 1820. That means his parents were born about 1800 or even before. We also have Choctaw and German ancestry on my father’s side.
On my mother’s side, we also have verifiable information to the mid-1800s, and we know that we have Scottish ancestry as well as African ancestry.
My parents were married for over 63 years before my Dad’s passing, and we are now six generations of Hilliards, Smiths, and Russells, after Rev. Thomas Hilliard and the Smiths and Russells on my mother’s side of the family.
Over the decades, our families have produced cooks, factory workers, teachers, lawyers, doctors, artists, journalists, professors, writers, domestic workers, chefs, accountants, and many other professions. Our family is like tens of millions of other Black families in America that have existed for centuries in this country.
The point is, why do some white people in America believe that Black people do not have the same rights to exist and live regular lives as they do? What gives them the right to think they are better than others and that our Black Lives do not matter? We have successes and failures and hopes and dreams just like everyone else.
We have contributed economically, culturally, educationally, scientifically, politically, and in every other way possible to the national and international growth of this country, yet we are rarely given credit for those contributions.
Yet we have been unfairly stereotyped, degraded, demeaned, humiliated, devalued, dishonored, and treated as less than human and thought of as not “real Americans.”
Black people and other people of color have been subjected to overt and covert racism for centuries, the point of which was to deliberately hold us down and hold us back from what is legally and morally ours as equal citizens of this country.
Why We March and Protest
The 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution, which was ratified in 1868, 152 years ago, reads in part: All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
We have been marching, protesting, fighting in courts and in Congress, for our equal rights for all of this time. We have the right NOT to be killed because some people think that our lives do not matter as much as theirs do. We march and protest for EQUAL PROTECTION UNDER THE LAW.
All Lives Cannot and Will Not Matter unless and until Black Lives Matter just as much as everyone else’s.
About Me
I am a native Detroiter, a wife, mother, grandmother, solopreneur, and homeowner. I would love for you to follow me on my personal Facebook and on my personal Instagram. Any opinions expressed in this publication are my own.
I also invite you to read the stories in my other publications: Your Business Your Brand Creatively and Detroit Ink Publishing.