Mr. Alton B. Sterling is his name. Alton Sterling was a 37 year old, devoted father of five whom’s price for peddling DVD’s to support his family was his life.
By now we’ve all seen this disturbing video. And as my chosen title suggests; when I view this footage, I can’t help but to feel as though I am watching yet another public execution of a black man whom if even for the sake of the argument was at any prior moment a perceived threat, at the moment of his murder he was fully restrained by not one, but two police. There have been several protests staged in the 24 hrs since his murder with echoing chants of “Black Lives Matter, Hands Up Don’t Shoot as well as the more familiar; No Justice, No Peace.”
Amidst an announcement that The Justice Department’s Civil Right’s Division has launched an investigation along with the F.B.I and The U.S Attorney’s Office in Baton Rouge, Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards has called for calm saying; “I know that that may be tough for some, but it’s essential that we do that. I know that there are protests going on, but it’s urgent that they remain peaceful.”
Does that bullshit sound familiar? I understand this system. More importantly, I understand that this system is as rigged as the WWE and that the champions are calculated and predetermined. What I don’t understand is how our community is currently filled with shooters, big homies, and gangstas who won’t hesitate to air out an entire city block occupied by their own peers to avenge stolen money or to make a point about disrespect. But when these demonic trash bags who although given authority to patrol our neighborhoods, are often not even citizens of our communities, execute our peers in cold blood without justification, all we can think to do is chant.
I am disgusted, angry, saddened and emotionally tired. At this point, all I would like to know is; when do we stop peacefully chanting and implement the ideology “Now if you shoot my dog, I’mma kill ya cat?” When does it become more than just an unwritten law of rap? Fuck an eye for an eye, I call for two sons for a son.
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