“When Did “Black” Lives Really Ever Matter?”

While sitting here watching television, unfolding before my very eyes is a police building on fire in the city of Minneapolis, Minnesota due to the murder of George Floyd by one of this city’s policemen. Immediately my mind strolled down memory lane and thought about all of the other African American lives that have been lost and brutalized in the same way since my forefathers were brought to this country on slave ships. The mistreatment of my people throughout the years has brought us to this point whereby a city is burning. How sad! In the book “Black Man’s Burden” by John Oliver Killens, which is an explosive attack on the complacency of white America, it says “Your black brother is spoiling for a fight in affirmation of his manhood,” he warns. “The more violence perpetrated against him…the more he becomes convinced that this thing cannot resolve itself non-violently, that only blood will wash away the centuries of degradation. The burden is on white America to prove otherwise. But you had better get going in a hurry, for we are at the brink.”

Another book that describes our forefather’s treatment is “The Slave Community” (Plantation Life In The Antebellum South) by John W. Blassingame) “The most serious impediment to the man’s acquisition of status in his family was his inability to protect his wife from the sexual advances of whites and the physical abuse of his master.”

Generally, however, the women had no choice but to submit to the sexual advances of white men. Henry Bibb wrote that “a poor slave’s wife can never be…true to her husband contrary to the will of her master. She can neither be pure nor virtuous, contrary to the will of her master. She dare not refuse to be reduced to a state of adultery at the will of her master. By all odds, the most brutal aspect of slavery was the separation of families. This was a haunting fear which made all of the slave’s days miserable.”

I guess that by now many of you are wondering why am I sharing this horrible information with you. Because, as they say, the fruit does not fall very far from the tree. These police that are committing these horrific acts against African Americans today are the distant relatives of those that were doing it back then. As the old saying goes “the fruit does not fall very far from the tree.” The Journal of Southern History” says that this book gives “A sober and sane treatment of an aspect of Negro slavery which has usually been neglected or distorted.” Our older folks used to tell us that “the fruit does not fall too far from its tree.” This behavior that some of these police are displaying towards us is something that has been passed down to them from their forefathers. How long did they expect us to sit idly by and not react to this horrible mistreatment? Let me share with you some words from “I Have A Dream” by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., “Protest: Certainly we all want to live the well-adjusted life in order to avoid neurotic and schizophrenic personalities. But I must honestly say…that there are some things in our nation and in our world of which I am proud to be maladjusted. I call upon all men of good will to be maladjusted until the good society is realized. I…never intend to adjust myself to segregation and discrimination. I never intend to become adjusted to religious bigotry. I never intend to adjust myself to madness of militarism and the self-defeating effects of physical violence. To cooperate passively with an unjust system makes the oppressed as evil as the oppressor.”

This which we see unfolding before our very eyes in Minneapolis, Minnesota is the result of much negligence that has been displayed towards the inhumane way that so many of us have been treated by many policemen. I am most definitely not saying that this type of inhumane treatment is done by “ALL” policemen but one’s silence toward this type of inhumane treatment displays one’s unconcern re: it. Leadership can play a very significant role in what does or does not happen in a community as it pertains to that community’s relationship with its police department.

Let me share this with you which is from the book “Black Robes, White Justice” – Why Our Legal System Doesn’t Work For Blacks-By The Late New York Supreme Court Justice Bruce Wright. “If the racial atmosphere in America is ever to be improved, the blacks who are called leaders must offer genuine leadership. They cannot simply be tools of the white establishment, for such leadership is ersatz and calculated to keep the anger of the blacks internal and tranquilized. It is the kind of leadership that was paraded through the ghetto of Miami during a racial disturbance, using loudspeakers to tell the blacks to count their American blessings and to go home and trust the very systems of Justice that caused rioting in the first place.

“Such leadership obeys a directed policy but does not make policy. Genuine black leadership must be muscular and not swayed by those who would neutralize it into puppetry. It must address publicly and express exactly what most blacks really think and feel about white American society and why. Passive acceptance of racism merely fertilizes the roots of that oppression and aids its growth.”

Lord have mercy on the people of Minneapolis, Minnesota and please make a way for “True Justice” to prevail. Please sensitize our city of Newburgh, N.Y. to the issues that are going on within our community re: Police Relations! Help us to be able to sit down together striving towards bringing a healing of the wounds that have been experienced by some within our community, as it pertains to our police department. Help us to realize that “With God “All” Things Are Possible And That “All” Lives Matter!”

Last, but most definitely not least, please make sure that you participate in the upcoming school board election. The ballot has been sent out in the mail so therefore make sure that you fill it out, choosing who you want to win in this upcoming school board election. Do it for the children! This ballot must be received by the office of the clerk of the school district no later than five p.m. on the day of the election which is June 9, 2020! PEACE!

This is “Lillie’s Point Of View” and I’m just having my say! Now it’s time for you to have yours!