You Should Never Be Silent On The Issues That Matter

Since the recent publicized killings of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, Unheard Voices Facebook has been getting relatively new attention on the stories that we cover and previously covered.

New and old articles of ours are starting to circulate the web as people look for significant dialogues on race relations. Rest assure, Unheard Voices is definitely a place where you can find such informative articles.

This past week, I shared a photo of a man that changed his Starbucks app to say #blacklivesmatter. For those of you who know Starbucks, whenever the barista finishes your order, they yell out your name to let you know the order is ready. So every time Lex Cross orders, the barista has no other choice to say Black Lives Matter.

Cross started this post, in what I grasp, to highlight the recent killings of non-threatening Black men.  So this is why I shared it. I thought it was interesting that Cross did this.

The post started to receive likes immediately. One commenter, who will remain nameless, proceeded to say “this is the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen”, followed by laughing emoji’s. I knew what he was implying, but I simply just asked him why. Nothing more. I wanted to engage in a dialogue with him, but in turn he would spew out a hateful and malicious message against an outlet and a person he doesn’t know.

I knew it was coming. I’ve watched debates online about the hashtag #blacklivesmatter. They are followed by arguments that all lives matter. The argument that blue lives matter. And the argument that whites are killed more than Black people by police, so why are people in protesting over black lives. When someone says that, what they mean is, are blacks truly over sensationalizing what’s happening to them? No, they are not. But these are the arguments I see on a daily when someone uses the hashtag #blacklivesmatter.

Without truly knowing or understanding the post, this person managed to say that Unheard Voices was a part of some media propaganda to separate this country and divide it.  I was more than disappointed. It was a personal attack. But I also read deep into his message and realized that he was actually saying matters like these need not to be talked about. As he states, “just because you go through something doesn’t mean you have to talk about it.” As a minority himself he said, he’s been through things and just rolls with the punches.

Probably, the most saddest thing you could do is just “roll with the punches”. My father was constantly harassed by the police for driving a brand new Mercedes Benz. At the time, he was a computer scientist and college professor. He and his CPA wife bought the Mercedes with their hard earned money. Yet, they were constantly reminded by the police their success didn’t matter simply because of the color of his skin. Had my father decided to “roll with the punches” (because that’s life), Unheard Voices would have not existed today.

I went full in. I gave him statistics about white vs blacks being killed. It seemed from his argument that he was trying to shut down that black lives don’t matter because white lives are killed more. But he vehemently overlooked the fact that 14.4% of the population is Black and 77% is white. Black and Latino’s are statistically stopped more during routine traffic stops.

He failed to take into account that a high number of cases where black people were killed by police were unarmed. He also further failed to look at disproportionate disadvantages that black Americans face and the stigmas that are put on them simply because of the color of their skin. Later on after I gave them these facts, he agreed they were valid.

But it wasn’t that statement from him that struck me, it was the personal attack on this so-called media agenda that he claims media outlets, particularly Unheard Voices outlets, are spewing. Some of the stuff he said was actually factual that some mainstream outlets are only posting because it helps them make money. But he put us into that category. I was flattered he thought we were some giant like NBC, but offended at the same time because he didn’t even know Unheard Voices or how we got started.

He failed to realize that progressive black outlets were started to tell stories of black people. Just like we have HBCUs. Just like we have Black banks. Just like we Black organizations. We have Black media outlets. Because no one will tell our stories CORRECLTY, but US.

What disturbed me completely was after telling him my experience, he said it wasn’t my obligation to speak on it.  His silence mentality struck a nerve. I never had the chance to say to him because I blocked him from the page, but I wanted to explain the Martin Luther King Jr. philosophy.

Martin Luther King Jr. and the freedom fighters did not believe in the words silence. It was the Civil Rights Movement of the 50s and 60s which enacted laws to make a person of color like him to live freely today. If they were silent on those issues that mattered, I am almost certain none of those policy changes and laws would have happened. It takes a movement.

In one of my graduate studies class, I wrote a paper entitled Black Violence : The Language of the Unheard. I spoke about how rioting led to significant changes and manifested the Black Power Movement that was a positive influence within black communities.

It was African American newspapers in the 50s and 60s that were circulated that told the positive stories of black Americans, not just only the afflictions.

It was boycotting and marching that lead to the Civil Rights Act and Voting Act of 1964 and 1965. If, during those times, people were silent on Jim Crow laws, segregation issues, things would have certainly been swept under the rug. Silence will never resolve problems. Silence lets it continue to germinate.

The theory of staying silent is the root of all problems today. For some reason, a majority of Americans have the “it doesn’t concern me” mentality and dare not talk about race relations. If you do talk about it, you are a “racist” and spreading some “hidden propaganda”.

Unfortunately, through a systemic racist system that obviously did not develop overnight, this country has never truly been integrated or “equal”. So how can media outlets, especially smaller managed ones, create a divide on a country that was never fully equal in the first place? Yes, some headlines are condescending saying “a black man was killed by a white police officer” instead of saying “a man was killed by a police officer”. But what is critically important is the comments that follow. That is not propaganda but true feelings that a lot of Americans share. A lot of those comments are hateful towards minorities. And that is something the media did not create by posting stories on police shootings. Just like Trump did not create racists. They were always there, just like America’s systematic racism. What I mean is, just because you fellowship with Black people, live among Black people, work with Black people, and see Black people in positions of power, did not suddenly makes things in America equal. There is still much work to do.

We need papers like the The Root, The Grio, Amsterdam News, Unheard Voices, Blativity, and even sites like RawStory & CopBlock, to talk about OUR stories. Us, telling our stories, have been around before social media started making black and brown issues go viral. Mainstream media outlets have no choice today to engage in dialogue because now the world is watching. We tend to forget how influential media is. The minute you see something happening whether it is positive or negative, for immediate exposure you go to a media outlet. Why? Because media outlets readership can help get your story heard. Now some of their agendas is another thing, but the meaning of smaller outlets like Unheard Voices is to give out a different perspective. Independent outlets are not controlled by the government. So therefore to say independent outlets are spewing some hidden agenda is really asinine, and it eliminates its influential existence. But I digress.

Like Jesse Williams said, if you don’t have any suggestions on how we can change systematic oppression, then do not try to silence me for telling our stories. You may not care about these issues, but there are a plethora of people who do. Unheard Voices has been here before the cameras started capturing it, and we will be here when it recedes.

I see many of you fighting for social justice through social media commentary. I write this piece for all of you to keep fighting and telling your stories. If you know you are not spewing hate but spreading knowledge toward social justice and change, do not let them silence you.

As Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said :

Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter