Black Lives Matter (BLM): “a political and social movement originating among African Americans, emphasizing basic human rights and racial equality for black people and campaigning against various forms of racism” (Dictionary.com)
The essence of BLM has been the rationale for numerous historic civil-rights movements for the past 500 years. However, the belief in equality has now manifested in the saying “Black Lives Matter” – this is the slogan of the movement which has come to the forefront of media attention in the past few years. It embodies the fight against systematic racism: the fight for justice.
As evidenced by Fig.1, the BLM hashtag has been used on social media over the past few years, resurfacing whenever unjustified crimes against Black citizens were perpetrated but then disappearing from the ‘trending hashtag’ list soon after. This time, it’s evident that the hashtag and this movement are not going anywhere – the movement is gaining more and more traction every day as protests and petitions become more frequent.
The movement doesn’t insinuate that Black lives matter more than any other race – rather, it's an acknowledgement of the racism that has plagued the USA since 1619 “when the privateer The White Lion brought 20 African slaves ashore in the British colony of Jamestown, Virginia” (History.com). The US was built upon slavery and, even though slavery was abolished in the 13th amendment, the foundation of discrimination, prejudice and racism has become so institutionalised that it's propagated at every level of the government and throughout society. This is what the phrase ‘Black Lives Matter’ is imploring people to recognise: the claim is a recognition of the socioeconomic disparity and perpetual racism that the Black community face.
However, the tenet of this article isn’t to explain the history of ‘Black Lives Matter’ – it’s to explain the redundancy of the claim ‘All Lives Matter’. As seen in Fig.1, the hashtag #AllLivesMatter is used 8x less than #BlackLivesMatter but the issue does not merely lie in the mass usage of the term. Instead, it lies in the essence of the claim.
The most simple way to explain the issue is through Fig.2If House A is on fire, the fire department is called there. The department is not called to every house in the city because while all houses may have the same non-monetary value and potential to burn down, House A is the only one which needs attention. Not all houses matter.
Ideally, all lives should matter equally but this isn’t emulated in the USA. The Black community have undergone nearly 500 years of racial struggles – black lives don’t matter to the same extent that White lives do so by claiming that All Lives Matter, you’re diluting the message.
Black people make up 40% of the prison population even though they are roughly only 13% of the total population – this showcases the injustice in the criminal justice system as Black people are 20% more likely to be sentenced to jail time and typically serve 20% longer sentences in comparison to White people who are convicted of similar crimes. Felony convictions make people lose their right to vote so, currently, nearly 8% of the adult African-American population in the USA is disenfranchised which further reduces the say of Black people in the will of the nation.
BLM’s goal is to point out that Black people are relatively undervalued in the US and to demonstrate to the country that the inequity needs to end. White people may experience hardship and discrimination but the colour of their skin will never be the reason – this is white privilege. If you see a homeless person and a rich person in their car on the street, who would you give $10 to? One would never give support to the privileged person because they already have what they deserve.
This is why “All Lives Matter” is, arguably, a tone-deaf phrase: it doesn’t recognise the racial prejudice the Black community faces daily and its relegating support to those who already have support from a biased system.
All lives cannot matter until Black lives matter.
Sources:
History.com Editors. "Slavery in America." HISTORY, 12 Nov. 2009, www.history.com/topics/black-history/slavery.
"History of the Hashtag #BlackLivesMatter: Social Activism on Twitter." Pew Research Center: Internet, Science & Tech, 31 Dec. 2019, www.pewresearch.org/internet/2016/08/15/the-hashtag-blacklivesmatter-emerges-social-activism-on-twitter/.
"All Lives Matter – Chainsawsuit by Kris Straub – Now That's What I Call Content." Chainsawsuit by Kris Straub – Now That's What I Call Content, chainsawsuit.com/tag/all-lives-matter/.
Statistics from : "7 Ways We Know Systemic Racism is Real." Https://www.benjerry.com, www.benjerry.com/home/whats-new/2016/systemic-racism-is-real.