A Glaring Double Standard
By: Anokhi Gududuri
The summer of 2020 saw a rise in protests, spurred by the death of George Floyd. People took to the streets to plead for the removal of systems of oppression and brutality in America. They marched, sang songs, and held vigils in an attempt to get their singular message across: the brutality against Black Americans by police needed to stop. Major news outlets paid little to no attention to the overwhelmingly peaceful amount of protests held throughout the country, instead opting to show footage of the very few protests that escalated to chaotic levels. According to a data collection conducted by the Harvard Radcliffe Institute, only 3.7% of the protests held during the summer of 2020 involved property damage or vandalism, with 97.7% of them having no record of injuries or illegal activity. These numbers contradict the negative stereotype perpetuated by the majority of news media that these protests always had some form of violence or a chaotic nature to them.
Though the news media certainly played a big role in painting a negative picture of protests and the Black Lives Matter movement, the continued actions of law enforcement illustrated the disturbing way Black Americans and people of color are treated by the police. One instance of BLM protestors faced with an absurd amount of violent police presence was at a peaceful violin vigil for Elijah McClain, a 23-year-old who died after being put in a neck hold by Denver policemen. People gathered in Aurora, Colorado to honor Elijah when police in riot gear came into the Municipal Center where protesters were peacefully sitting together. Police started to beat them with batons and spray tear gas for no reason. This violent behavior, coupled with the dangerous weapons police have in their possession, made it so that thousands of peaceful protestors across the U.S. were injured while exercising their first amendment rights. This repeated hostile behavior raises a serious question: why are protestors met with such excessive force by law enforcement? And why have we not doubled down on the perpetrators of that violence, whose very job is to protect their communities from harm?
This behavior is extremely alarming, but what makes it worse is the distinct way in which police are deployed in certain situations. The glaring difference in the way the police are used can be seen in many instances where the people being policed are not people of color. A recent example of this occurred not too long after the BLM protests, in January of 2021, where Trump supporters stormed the capitol building in D.C. and were able to severely disrupt important democratic processes. Despite the fact that the protest was discussed on social media platforms and encouraged by Former President Donald Trump, there was no move to station the national guard or the D.C. metropolitan police outside the capitol in an attempt to subdue potentially violent crowds. However, when peaceful Black Lives Matter protestors were a block away from the capitol a couple months before, it was lined with national guard troops and even had an army helicopter fly overhead. The only difference between the two crowds aside from their political affiliations was the racial makeup. The predominantly white crowd of Trump supporters who marched on the capitol were allowed to breach the capitol, steal artifacts, and go after legislatures while the pentagon made no moves until several hours later to deploy any sort of deterrent.
The treatment of Black Americans by law enforcement has been and will continue to be a pressing issue if we continue to turn their struggles into hashtags and instagram posts that lose traction in a couple months. We need to question why there is such a stark difference in the way the news media portrays the actions of minorities versus the white. America has to reach a climax where people in charge take leadership and make systemic changes to our policing system. We need reform that serves all people with dignity and kindness regardless of race, gender, or age.