Melissa Harris-Perry sends an open letter to America titled “This Country Is No Place for Young Black Men” in Reaction to the shooting death of Jordan Davis (RIP). Like the murders of Trayvon Martin and Emmett Till, as Melissa mentions, are just three prime instances in which they were killed because they “looked” threatening. In good conscience is this a reason to “Stand Your Ground”?
The fact is; they are not threatening at all and I allege racial profiling at its core. This is a powerful message of conscience to be considered. And that’s my Thought Provoking Perspective…
“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”
“I refuse to accept the view that mankind is so tragically bound to the starless midnight of racism and war that the bright daybreak of peace and brotherhood can never become a reality… I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word.”
“Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over. And I’ve seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people will get to the promised land.”
“My husband was a man who hoped to be a Baptist preacher to a large, Southern, urban congregation. Instead, by the time he died in 1968, he had led millions of people into shattering forever the Southern system of segregation of the races.” ~ Coretta Scott King (1927-2006)
“Change does not roll in on the wheels of inevitability, but comes through continuous struggle. And so we must straighten our backs and work for our freedom. A man can’t ride you unless your back is bent.”
“Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.”
“Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable… Every step toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering, and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals.”
“I submit that an individual who breaks the law that conscience tells him is unjust and willingly accepts the penalty by staying in jail to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the very highest respect for law.”
“It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can keep him from lynching me, and I think that’s pretty important.”
Return from prison
“He who passively accepts evil is as much involved in it as he who helps to perpetrate it. He who accepts evil without protesting against it is really cooperating with it.”
MLK family
“I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.”
“From every mountainside, let freedom ring. When we let freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, ‘Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!”
“The first question which the priest and the Levite asked was: “If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?” But… the good Samaritan reversed the question: “If I do not stop to help this man, what will happen to him?”
Assassination of Dr.King
“Nonviolence means avoiding not only external physical violence but also internal violence of spirit. You not only refuse to shoot a man, but you refuse to hate him.”
“I submit to you that if a man hasn’t discovered something that he will die for, he isn’t fit to live.”
Dr.King’s Funeral
“That old law about ‘an eye for an eye’ leaves everybody blind. The time is always right to do the right thing.”
“If physical death is the price that I must pay to free my white brothers and sisters from a permanent death of the spirit, then nothing can be more redemptive.”
In Remembrance: Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968)
Traveling through this journey made me realize where we’ve come from and how far we have to go. I don’t know why-but there was so much unity at that time. I’m sure things weren’t perfect-but men protected their women. Men couldn’t hit a woman in front of another man at that time, however my generation. Not only can a man hit a woman, he will rape her, him and his friends. Dr.King Dream for unity within ethnicity was accomplished, but the division in the black community was conquered!
I often chose topics that allow me to offer a view from a different perspective that is intended to produce a thought provoking reaction. With that said I do not wish to imply that when someone has done something wrong or committed a crime and found guilty beyond a reasonable doubt that the appropriate punishment or sanction should not be applied. Now, as the great Richard Pryor so amply stated “when justice is rendered to us in the courts. What we get it is ‘Just Us!’”
Everyone knows that fairness in the realm of justice is highly suspect at best when it comes to the African American community and black men in particular. This brings me to the Troy Davis case. Davis is scheduled to die by lethal injection on Wednesday Sept. 21 more than two decades after someone pointed him out, following a 1989 shooting death of a police officer in Savannah, Ga.
The Davis Case has drawn global support from Amnesty International to the NAACP, and I will include myself. Even conservative figures, including former Rep. Bob Barr and ex-Justice Department official Larry Thompson, have urged Georgia officials to spare Davis’ life. The concern here is that since his conviction several witnesses have recanted there testimony. New witnesses have come forward to say another man was at the scene of the crime who is actually the killer. None the less, the courts have upheld the conviction repeatedly and a judge who was ordered to review Davis’ innocence claims said his arguments amount to “smoke and mirrors.”
To be fair, I don’t know if Davis is innocent or guilty but if witnesses have recanted and there’s reasonable doubt, the execution should be stayed and this Defendant should be granted a new trial. From what I have read there are too many questions and no hard evidence. It is not unheard of for the courts to reexamine cases where there are factual concerns but this usually happens when the Defendant has money – we know that. The prison population is full of minorities who can ill afford adequate legal representation.
Davis now 41 has been on death row for the last two decades for killing Savannah Police Officer. We also know of cases all over the country where people are wrongly convicted, serve years in prison and put to death. With the advent of DNA cases are reversed frequently and several states have halted executions altogether. Just this week the Supreme Court Halted Duane Buck’s Execution because of errors made in this Texas case where an expert testified that a black man was more likely to commit further crimes because of this race claim.
Davis was 19 years old when he was arrested for killing officer Mark MacPhail in 1989. People are concerned about this case and protesting because no murder weapon was found and there was no DNA evidence. He was arrested due to questionable witness statements; 10 questionable witnesses in the case have signed affidavits withdrawing their statement saying that police forced them into accusing the 41 year old. This is reason enough for a new trial in this case in my opinion.
One of the jurors in the trial told Brenda Davis CNN in a 2009 interview that “If I knew then what I know now Troy Davis would not be on Death Row. The verdict would be ‘not guilty.” Last night, there were more than 2000 coordinated rallies from downtown Atlanta to Ebenezer Baptist Church on Auburn Avenue on Friday showing support for Davis. Martin Luther King III, son of the late civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., also joined the march. For years the case has been attracting much attention. Many notables like former president Jimmy Carter, Pope Benedict XVI and Nobel laureate Desmond Tutu have urged authorities to spare Davis’ life.
Laura Moye, the Death Penalty Abolition campaign director for Amnesty International USA, said that rallies for Davis were first started in Hong Kong. Those rallies went on throughout the day in the United States, Latin America, Europe and Asia. There were 10 events in France on behalf of Davis. The Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles received petitions with 663,000 names urging clemency on Thursday. The board is scheduled to meet on Monday to consider whether to stop Davis’ execution by lethal injection.
The U.S. Supreme Court ordered a new trial for Davis in August 2009 to judge what he said was new evidence showing his innocence. The U.S. Supreme Court then transferred the case to a U.S. District Court in Georgia for the trial. But a year later, the judge, William T. Moore Jr., discarded Davis’ claims of innocence.
I am opposed to the death penalty because lady justice shows that the scales are unbalanced and she is blind. Moreover, I agree with Richard “what we get is JUST US. And that is my THOUGHT PROVOKING PERSPECTIVE…
It's been said that there are no words that have not been spoken and no stories that have never been told but there are some that you cannot forget! "Legacy - A New Season" is the perfect complement to that statement.
It is the sequel and the continuation of "Just a Season" and a stand-alone story rich in history on a subject rarely explained to children of this generation concerning the African American struggle.
Just a Season is a luminous story into the life of a man who, in the midst of pain and loss, journeys back in time to reexamine all the important people, circumstances, and intellectual fervor that contributed to the richness of his life...
“Knowledge is power and power produces an understanding that education is the single most important ingredient necessary to neutralize those forces that breed poverty and despair.” — John T. Wills
Melissa Harris-Perry sends an open letter to America titled “This Country Is No Place for Young Black Men” in Reaction to the shooting death of Jordan Davis (RIP). Like the murders of Trayvon Martin and Emmett Till, as Melissa mentions, are just three prime instances in which they were killed because they “looked” threatening. In good conscience is this a reason to “Stand Your Ground”?
Thought Provoking Perspectives
