In the mid-1950s, Martin Luther King Jr. began fighting for the rights of Black Americans as a civil rights movement leader. King went to Birmingham, Alabama because he saw it as the most segregated city in the entire country. While attempting to end segregation in Birmingham, King was jailed along with 3,000 other men. During his time in jail, King wrote “Letters from Birmingham City Jail” (Batten 165). Although King made much progress in the fight for the rights of Black Americans, Black Americans are still not treated equally today. In 2012, Trayvon Martin, a 17 year old high school student, was shot and killed by George Zimmerman, a police officer in Florida. Despite taking the life of Martin, Zimmerman was not charged for his murder. It …show more content…
The Police Commissioner in Birmingham was Bull Connor, who was strongly opposed to the civil rights movement. Connor had authority over the Birmingham Police Department and with this power, Connor sought to keep segregation in Birmingham. Connor used his power to put many Black Americans in jail, as well as break up peaceful protests through brutal displays of aggression (Batten 164). When describing this aggression and violence, King mentioned seeing “hate-filled policemen curse, kick, and even kill your black brothers and sisters” (224). King uses this language to show law enforcement treated Black Americans brutally even though they had the constitutional right to peacefully protest. When speaking to the clergymen in his “Letters from Birmingham Jail”, King writes more about the brutality from law enforcement. He writes, “You warmly commend the Birmingham police force for keeping ‘order and ‘preventing violence.’ I doubt that you would have so warmly commended the police force if you had seen its dogs sinking their teeth into unarmed nonviolent Negroes… I cannot join you in your praise of the Birmingham police department” (King 236). King uses this graphic description in an attempt to show the brutality of the local law enforcement and hopefully change the minds of those that commended the Birmingham police force. In …show more content…
Some of the controversy of the movement can be attributed to people not understanding the crucial aspects of the BLM Movement. When discussing one of the crucial aspects, Granger and his colleagues said, “‘Black lives Matter’ never intended to suggest that other lives do not matter. Rather, the implicit message in stating ‘Black Lives Matter’ is ‘All lives matter, but our society acts as if Black lives do not matter; therefore, we need to be explicit that Black lives also matter in order for all lives to matter’”(597). Granger and his colleague aim to further define the BLM Movement. They clarify the phrase “Black Lives Matter” by stating, although all lives matter, special focus must be put on Black lives since years of oppression and racism show that Black lives have mattered less than all lives. Many people, such as Republicans and right wing politicians, see the BLM Movement as a violent and anti-White movement. A writer in the New York Times says, “The Republican Party and its acolytes in the news media are trying to demonize the protest movement… cast the phrase ‘Black Lives Matter as an inflammatory or even hateful anti-white expression that has no legitimate place in a civil rights campaign” (The Truth 1). The writer from the New York Times discusses how people, typically from the right wing, have been trying to discredit the BLM movement by spreading the idea that