Civil Disobedience: The Black Lives Matter Movement

A necessary and common fight for equality has been one that has survived throughout all of man’s existence. Due to recent racial divide and the product of racial profiling, a movement has risen up to combat these common issues. The most recent and most well-covered is the Black Lives Matter Movement. Even though it has been lauded by some media sources and individuals as the next great movement to champion for civil rights, the Black Lives Matter movement is not the same as the African-American Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s nor is it likely to be as successful. If the Black Lives Matter Movement continues with discrepancies in ideology, lack of clear leadership, and trends of hate, the movement is doomed to fail.

Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi created a movement centered towards black Americans which later turned into Black Live Matter. Those three leaders came together in 2013 after the Trayvon Martin case that devastated the black community. Black Live Matter, also known as BLM, became an organization that has a mission to give power and a voice to violence inflicted on Black communities. So many black injustices went unnoticed and ignored, but this group will not stand to let that happen again. Injustice to the black community is what causes so many protests and movements that make the Black Lives Matter organization stronger than ever. .

In the United States, there has been many cases of Racial injustice. From the beginning of the start of the United States of America it was the injustice to the Native Americans being captured and used for slave labor while their bison be slaughtered for sportsmanship. But this paper is on the specific race of the African Americans. There are many races that have been racially profiled and ostracized by the English people. But the treatment that African Americans have endured even till this day is disheartening. African Americans have gone through enslavement during the early 1600’s to the mid 1800’s. Then the African Americans were obstructed by the Jim Crow laws creating the ‘Separate but Equal” propaganda during the late 1800’s into the 1960’s. After the abolishment of the Jim Crow Laws, people were considered equal until the recent actions of many police officers using deadly force on African American youths in the early 2000’s.

After his death, a group of protesters chanting “black lives matter” shut down a local shopping mall which lead to further deaths of unarmed black men. The phrase started appearing on t-shirts and posters banners everywhere. Black Lives Matter surfaced and the movement created itself. There are now more than 37 movement chapters in the U.S and one in Canada. “The movement doesn’t win if there’s only a small set of people who understand the solutions. It wins when there’s a broad understanding that we need a system that doesn’t kill people, when a critical mass of citizens can envision what that looks like, and what concrete steps are taken to make it happen.” Says Deray Mckesson, a 29-year-old man who drove 600 miles to witness the Ferguson scene himself. McKesson met a woman here who he began sharing information about events and tweeting updates, who then quickly became the most recognizable figures associated with the movement in

The movement “Black Lives Matter” was founded officially in 2013, but began in 2012 with the trial of George Zimmerman allegedly murdering Trayvon Martin(Miller). The movement was founded by multiple people including: Patrisse Cullors, Alicia Garza, and Opal Tometi(Miller). From its creation, Black Lives Matter has been involved in a series of protests which have frequently turned violent, and given the movement a poor reputation among US citizens. However, some of the uppers in the movement claim that the only way for people of America to really pay attention to their movement is to partake in civil disobedience(Green). With the movement having a side aimed at potentially harming others for attention or a spotlight from the media, the people within the movement appear to want this problem solved now for the harm to stop on both fronts. The people involved in the movement also state, “We’re going to curse at you. We’re going to throw some stuff at you. We might even tip over a police car or two, but you will not just come into our

For the past few years, racial tensions have been on the rise. Although many actions have been taken to prevent these conflicts from occurring, African Americans are still being undervalued by the state. As more African Americans are being turned away with little to no assistance from the American government, anger and the desire for change increased among them. When Trayvon Martin’s murderer George Zimmerman was acquitted for his crime, a great number of Americans were furious at the outcome. Three African American women named Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi expressed their view on a Facebook post titled “A Love Note to Black People” and it ends with “Our Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter” (“Black Lives Matter”). Thus, a new liberation movement for black people was born. The hashtag #BlackLivesMatter rapidly spread throughout social media, bringing awareness of the struggles of African Americans. The Black Lives Matter movement is a call to action to eradicate the dehumanization of African Americans that exists in American society. With the constant targeting of African Americans by the police and the unfair treatment in the criminal justice system, the Black Lives Matter movement is a necessity to combat racism.

Civil Disobedience is a right that is afforded to all people. When Civil Disobedience is used as a method of getting your point across to the government and law officials it is ok although when things turn violent and get out of control then that is when it is bad. Carl Cohen feels that Civil Disobedience is a method that condones going against authority and promotes violence while Henry Thoreau believe that Civil Disobedience is a great way to draw attention to the wrongs that need to be made right. I believe that everyone should have the right to express themselves without fear of negative response. Recently here in Charlotte NC with the death of Lamont Scott, who was believed to be an unarmed black man killed by a cop, there was Civil

The above narrative is just a mere glimpse of the hurt, anger, and pain in the black community after George Zimmerman was acquitted of charges of second degree murder against seventeen year old Trayvon Martin. These emotions were the stepping stones of a highly significant movement, the Black Lives Matter movement. The Black Lives Matter movement is a response as well as a stance against police brutality against African Americans, which uses the tragic deaths of teenagers Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown as a head for its cause. Many people on social media know the black lives matter movement or refer to it #blacklivesmatter, especially on twitter. The Black Lives Matter movement was founded by Patrisse Cullers, Opal Tometi, and Alicia Garza. Which is defined as an “ideological and political intervention in a world where black lives are systematically and intentionally targeted for demise. It is an affirmation of Black folks contributions to this society, our humanity, and our resilience in the face of deadly oppression.”

The Black Lives Matter movement is a rally dedicated to “Black Lives”, minorities, who are not treated equally by their community with the intent of causing change in order to have equal justice and opportunities. This movement revolves around the idea of laboratories of democracy because as a community they seek out the injustice and put into question the relation with the issue; thus, allowing the people to support their ideas and convince others that racial injustice exists. Similarly, as a community they are able to build upon an overall understanding on the inequality which prepare the people to question the idea of democracy they have lived by. An excerpt from The Huffington Post inquires the equality demonstrated in the judicial court,

The black lives matter movement can be deliberated to be a new social movement as it looks at some of the actions which are grounded by policy making and the ideology as the root of collective action. A procedures that fits into this movement is the Collective Behaviour Theory. The theory refers to the events that emerge suddenly and don’t often conform to the laws or rules but as in alternative which is often base on the issues at hand. For instance the Black Lives Matter movement came together as a community as their collective identity matches one another. (Being African American or loosing someone to police violence) This also fits under ‘Grass-roots’ as it is driven by the ‘locals’ who are often

The Black Lives Matter movement has swept across America. It 's branched out with chapters in over 31 cities and held rallies and boycotts across the United States(Sidner). The Black Lives Matter movement started with the outrage of the death of a young man. It continues to take over headlines and raise awareness on police brutality and inequality. However, the movement has met resistance from the All Lives Matter group. This group thinks that Black Lives Matter is a movement to express hatred towards other races. However, statistics, the views of fellow citizens, and the overall purpose of the Black Lives Matter movement, can prove that the movement wasn 't meant to express hate on other races and that we need to support the movement instead of going against it.

Have you ever done something that would be considered that will be called civil disobedience? Civil disobedience is the act of opposing a law one considers unjust and peacefully disobeying it while accepting the consequences. In my opinion civil disobedience is the right way the too disobey the law if it isn’t a violent way of protesting. Peacefully resistance to laws positively and negatively impact a free society. A lot of civil disobedience happens now and days like people protesting when trump was elected president or people protesting with Martin Luther King Jr when he protested. If you want to disobey a law peacefully the best was is to do it in a civil way.

Throughout the course of the month, we have as a class had several interesting discussions in relation to social inequality. The Black Live Matter movement and the different cases of shootings that has occurred recently have been one of the topics that we touched on in class. In the beginning of the month, when we were asked about our opinions and initial thoughts about the Black Lives Matter movement, one student mentioned the nowadays there are negative connotations regarding this movement instead of representing positivity and equality towards the lives of African Americans. I found this comment interesting because I also believe that there are several misconceptions regarding this matter. For example, many individuals still believe that

Black Lives Matter has been conducted for four years since 2013. Through the movement of Black Lives Matter make people pay more and more attention and improve the social status of blacks. Black Lives Matter already experienced eight stages of social movement which is the normal time, prove the failure of official institutions, ripening conditions, take-off, perceptions of failure, majority public opinion, success and continuing the struggle. Firstly, previously people did not pay great attention to the Black Lives Matter, however, in 2012. Martin was shot by neighbor George Zimmerman, Zimmerman was acquitted after a year and a half. After the event of three African-American women creates a ‘Black Lives Matter ‘slogan in the social media

There is a distinct difference between civil disobedience and riots. To combine both terms as “civil disobedience” is an insult to the people that inspired to create a difference for the better. The issues we have today whether or not it's debatable, people will always go against for different reasons. Some disobedience is a necessary for a change in society, as the Rosa Parks case for example. The case applied that a woman named Rosa Parks would not give up her seat for a white man at the time of segregation. She did not yell nor fought with anyone but remained seated as a silent protest which inspired others to do the same until the segregation law has ceased. This was one of the many cases of civil disobedience that influence new suggestions of