
If Black Lives Matter, Then Why Are They Being Murdered?
By Kenneth R. Jenkins
On a Public Radio interview, I heard someone called Black Lives Matter a group that all they do is excite riots in the streets and start trouble with the police. If this person would live in our neighborhoods and constantly seeing our young Black men being shot down like dogs by those same people who suppose to “protect and serve” then he would understand why there is so much anger in our streets because the blood is being spilled in our streets.
The Black Lives Matter Movement is a movement of awareness of what our police officers are doing to our young men by shooting the down especially those who are unarmed. This is the reason why they exist for that purpose in order to indict these police officer are shooting down our young black men in the streets of our cities. Remember Travon Martin? Remember what happened to him?
No, Black Lives Matter isn’t a group of thugs that bullies police officers and insight riots and burning down businesses for no reason whatsoever. Yes we are angry of what has happened but they are not thugs.
Black Lives Matter (BLM) is an international activist movement, originating in the African-American community, that campaigns against violence and systemic racism toward black people. BLM regularly holds protests against police killings of black people and broader issues of racial profiling, police brutality, and racial inequality in the United States criminal justice system. (source Wikkipedia).
The Black Lives Matter movement, which came to national prominence in the wake of the 2014 police shooting of an unarmed black 18-year-old in Ferguson, Missouri, continues to gain attention following other incidents involving the deaths of black Americans during encounters with the police.
Juliana Menasce Horowitz and Gretchen Livingston wrote an article on How Americans view the Black Lives Matter movement according to the Pew Research Center.
A recent Pew Research Center survey conducted Feb. 29-May 8, 2016, found that general awareness of Black Lives Matter is widespread among black and white U.S. adults, but attitudes about the movement vary considerably between groups people kill others. Not all Black people sell or do drugs. Not all Black people have baby mama drama. Not all Black people act like those Housewives, Basketball wives, or divas with big hair, big boobs, big butts,long finger nails and filthy mouths. And no not all Blacks don’t walk around like thug with their pants hanging down to their butt showing what dignity that’s left.
The Black Lives Movement wants to save lives of our young people, keeping them out of jails and prisons but seeing that every one of them live beyond 18 or 20 or 25 years-old.
Here are some key findings about Americans’ views of the Black Lives Matter movement:

Roughly four-in-ten Americans support the Black Lives Matter movement. All told, 43% support the movement, including 18% who strongly support it. About one-in-five Americans (22%) oppose the movement, and a sizable share (30%) said they have not heard anything about the Black Lives Matter movement or did not offer an opinion.
Support for Black Lives Matter is particularly high among blacks: 65% support the movement, including 41% who strongly support it; 12% of blacks say that they oppose the movement. Among whites, 40% express support, while 28% say they oppose Black Lives Matter.

Among whites, Democrats and those younger than 30 are particularly supportive of Black Lives Matter. White Democrats are about as likely as blacks to express at least some support for the Black Lives Matter movement — about two-thirds (64%) do, compared with 42% of white independents and 20% of white Republicans.
Among white adults younger than 30, six-in-ten say they support the Black Lives Matter movement at least somewhat. About half (46%) of whites ages 30 to 49, and even fewer among those ages 50 to 64 (37%) and those 65 and older (26%), express support for the movement. It is worth noting, however, that about three-in-ten whites ages 50 and older (28%) say they haven’t heard anything at all about Black Lives Matter.
About a third of Americans familiar with Black Lives Matter say they don’t understand the goals of the movement. Roughly two-thirds (64%) of those who have heard at least a little about Black Lives Matter say they understand the movement’s goals very or fairly well. Still, about a third (36%) of those who have heard about Black Lives Matter say they don’t understand its goals too well — or at all. Blacks who have heard at least a little about Black Lives Matter are far more likely than whites who have some general awareness of the movement to say they understand its goals very well (42% vs. 16%). About four-in-ten whites who have heard of Black Lives Matter (38%) say they don’t understand the movement’s goals particularly well.

Blacks are more likely than whites to say the Black Lives Matter movement will be effective in the long run. About six-in-ten blacks (59%) believe that Black Lives Matter will ultimately be effective in bringing about racial equality. Whites are about evenly divided: 34% say the Black Lives Matter movement will be effective in helping blacks achieve equality, while 39% say the movement won’t be effective; another 26% either weren’t familiar with the movement or didn’t provide an opinion. Among blacks, skepticism about the effectiveness of Black Lives Matter may reflect broader skepticism about the future of racial equality in the U.S. Our survey found that fully 43% of blacks doubt that the U.S. will ever make the changes needed for blacks to have equal rights with whites. Some 11% of whites feel this way.
Now, does Black Lives Matter? After reading what The Pew Research Center, somewhere in my heart yes Black Lives does matter to me for the sake of my nieces and nephews it REALLY does matter.
Kenneth R. Jenkins is a freelance writer, poet, podcast host/producer, minister and devoted husband living in Savannah, GA.
