Trayvon Martin's Struggle In The US

Leslie McFadden is the mother of the eighteen-year-old boy, Michael Brown who was killed by a police officer back in 2014. After her son’s death, Mrs. McFadden has traveled nationally to speak on behalf of her son and seek justice. This past October, Mrs. McFadden shared her testimony at the black studies conference in UT Austin, where she was described as a “wife, fighter, and believer in hope.” At the conference Mrs. McFadden discussed different themes such as the institutionalized racial segregation and violence she and many face in Ferguson. The nightmare of racial hatred is not a thing of the past but a present reality. Her strong will to move forward and to speak the truth makes Mrs. McFadden this generations Mamie Till. Through her personal experience Mrs. McFadden connect with the audience at a level a textbook can’t and encourages them to be vocal against injustice.

Today in America there has been a growing problem amongst people and the police force. There has been many cases over the past couple of years were the police has used brute force on citizens. The main group of people suffering from police brutality is young African Americans. The young blacks feel that they are being targeted by the police. These cases continue to happen with no signs of stopping anytime soon. The police have been using brute force on black Americans for years now. There was a major that spark awareness on police brutality a couple of years ago. This case was the Trayvon Martin case that stated the whole black lives matter movement. This case was one of the key features to start the black lives matter movement.

For many years, the black and brown communities have been making claims of the prolific abuse endured at the hands of police officers, the very organization whose job it is to protect and serve. And for years, it has been accepted by the minority communities as a way of life for black and brown Americans. It made excellent materials for comedians, movies and fodder for minorities to unite over at the water cooler. But that all changed when George Zimmerman, a neighborhood watchman, and aspiring cop, shot and killed 17-year-old Trayvon Martin. Many minorities were incensed by the Sanford Florida city police decision not to charge Zimmerman and his subsequent not-guilty verdict after a massive public cry for his arrest. Black American across the nation felt they had

The motivation behind the police in the administration is to secure and serve and to convey crooks under the control of the law. Police are in charge of getting lawbreakers who undermine the job, property and tranquility of different subjects. But it's a different reality brought up by the article, "Trayvon Martin Case Shadowed by Series of Police Missteps." The New York Times has the police department be viewed as tragic heros. For it states what the police officers could of done that night to know what really happen, like “The police were not able to cover the crime scene to shield evidence from the rain, and any blood from cuts that Mr. Zimmerman suffered when he said Mr. Martin pounded his head into a sidewalk may have been washed away.”

There has been a vast increase in racial crimes and movements within the past decade; with community marches and rallies being held after the deaths of unarmed African-Americans occurring within their place of refuge. This exhibition of African-American versus European American is nothing new to be seen, since it holds such a presence in American history, and it continues out of greed, injustice, and ignorance. Racism, as a belief system, and the acts committed as a result are merely distractions that guide our own selfishness and immorality.

Racism in the United States has been a major issue since the colonial era. In 2012, an organization called Black Lives Matter was created by Alicia Garza, Opal Tometi, and Patrisse Cullors. This organization was created after 17-year-old Trayvon Martin’s murderer, George Zimmerman, was not held accountable. The purpose of this organization was to spread awareness of “white supremacy” in the court, and racial controversies that are against African-American people (“A HerStory of the #BlackLivesMatter Movement”). Although the Black Lives Matter organization has a great purpose, it also caused more racial controversies within societies.

As slavery was abolished in 1865 the problems still continued, laws were not enforced enough, and society started to create their own laws, and organizations such as the Black Codes, the Jim Crow Laws, and the Ku Klux Klan, which segregated and made every single person who was not white feel like an underdog, African Americans were segregated and blamed for many crimes, public lynchings to which people brought their children, and family to watch, the line of human decency was far gone, being black always meant danger, “I 'm black, I don’t have to do anything for ‘em to get me. The first white finger they point at me, I’m a goner...They own everything. They choke you off the face of the earth… They kill you before you die” (Wright, 325). No doubt things have changed since the late 1800’s, the involvement of African Americans in the everyday life of America makes them feel represented, from President Truman’s decision to integrate any person of color in the military in 1948, to the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960’s, but there is still so much hatred towards black people, and so much injustice, the United States claims to have a Justice that is blind, yet a study in CNN shows that Black men are more likely to be wrongly convicted, once again a failed system, where problems like racism are scarcely addressed because of fear

In looking at the vast amount of inequalities that continues to oppress black lives, seeing them is often impossible. Although we can hear the experiences of monitories and sympathize with the injustice they continue to experience, the dominant white culture will never be able to compute the visceral feelings that minorities experience on a day to day basis. Even when the dominant white culture attempts to seek an understanding of minority lives, it is done with a biased back ground. Joshua Solomon,

In 2012 Trayvon Martin who was a seventeen-year-old black male was targeted and killed by a Florida Neighborhood watch captain named George Zimmerman (Alcindor, USA Today). From the eyes of many people Zimmerman was looked as a White male that was racist, but in the eyes of the legal system or various non-black communities he was looked at as the victim. Throughout Trayvon Martin's case sides were taken from a government standpoint that were supposed to remain unbiased. Due to the biases that were occurring in the legal process Zimmerman was looked at as a victim instead of the victimizer. With the perspective people looked at him as the scapegoat. It changed the way the Black community moved forward. No longer would they be able to stand on the sidelines and let countless other Black members of their community be taken advantage

Black people continue to die in the streets at the hands of racist police who kill with impunity, as black communities continue to suffer from high rates of unemployment, imprisonment and generational poverty. And despite the so called progress over the last decades, black youth are systematically denied the resources they need to achieve higher education and break out of the endless cycles of poverty.

In 2013, Trayvon Martin’s life suddenly ended. This moment sticks out in my mind clearly- a black teen carrying Skittles and a can of Arizona tea was murdered in cold blood by a police officer- and outrage was rising. The key word there is black, as in black lives matter. A social media movement formed out of that one moment, that outrage, in 2013, but I didn’t really understand it at the time (After all, shouldn’t all lives matter? Why are we singling out black people?). That understanding came to me a year later- the year of police brutality.

Throughout history, African Americans have found numerous ways to cope with the inequalities that society has dealt to them. One example of this is the Black Power movement. The Black Power movement was a political movement that helped African Americans achieve their civil rights. This movement was ran by the Black Panther Party and they justified the use of violence in the “accomplishment of black justice” (“Black Power Movement”). Today, African Americans are still dealing with the same inequalities that they dealt with in the 1960s and 1970s. African Americans are still being treated unequally in the work force and society in general. African Americans now have better jobs then they did before but, they are not getting paid the same as someone who identifies with being Caucasian. African Americans are getting sent to prison or getting shot to death because of the color of their skin and that they “looked like a thug.” In 2013, a new movement began among black people; the Black Lives Matter movement. The Black Lives Matter movement is an ideology and is bringing light to the injustices and inequalities that society has given to them. “Black Lives Matter is 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” (“Black Lives Matter”). In this essay we will be looking

“Four Negro men were shot this morning in Georgia,” a news reporter said. Reports like this aired on television for the rest of the day, and continued for the next two weeks. Jesse didn’t go to school for five days straight because his parents feared for his safety. Hundreds of people had been arrested for arson, looting, and violence in the past week. This went on for months, people were killed and many were injured. Jesse and his family didn’t feel safe in their own home until the National Guard joined the police force and stopped the crime. At first the African-American race was stupefied by the loss of Martin Luther King Jr. Eventually, though, the African-americans had come to realize that even without Dr. King, they could still stand for what was right. Nevertheless, they began to follow through with Dr. King’s dreams and goals; eventually they found justice for their

The African American fight for civil rights has been a time-consuming conflict in the United States of America. More than 50 years after The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was signed, African Americans are still treated differently from their white peers. While some people believe that African American equality was solved with the election of Barack Obama as President of the United States of America, this is not correct. Ever since the election of President Barack Obama, unarmed African Americans are still being murdered by their American peers, causing the Black Lives Matter movement. The Black Lives Matter movement was formed after Trayvon Martin, a young black male, was murdered by George Zimmerman. While the 21st century is here, African American racial inequalities are still a major problem.

The article "Michael Brown And Black People” that was published on The New York Times on August 13, 2014 and written by the author Charles M. Blow informs us about the tragic problem with society and racism against black men. The police officers have abused their power and took advantage of black people and sometimes even kill them just because they feel that they are a threat to society. Mr. Blow states that Michael Brown was one of the victims that got killed because a police officer thought that he was a threat to the society. Black people our judge by their skin color and often blamed for a crime that they never committed. Furthermore, the author informs us also that the Department of Education states that black people never finish their education because they were mistreated in school or early childhood. Some black people were not giving the opportunity to expand their education or become someone successful in life.