Abstract
Long before three African American women registered the twitter handle, #BlackLivesMatter, and started sending out tweets that helped to mobilize the spontaneous outrage against the impunity that followed the killings of unarmed black people by police officers and by vigilante in the US, there was always a rich history of resistance against criminal justice oppression by people of African descent and their allies. Apologists for white supremacist violence tend to reject the truism that Black Lives Matter by countering with All Lives Matter as if the later could hold if the former is rejected. In other words, since All Lives Matter, it follows that Black Lives Matter too and if by any logic Black Lives do not Matter, then All Lives do not Matter. The reason why it is even necessary to state what should be obvious, that Black Lives Matter, is exactly because there are still people who believe that certain lives belong to the homo sacer and are disposable to be taken without any consequences. This editorial complicates this issue by demonstrating the theory of Martin Luther King Jr. that injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. By treating Black Lives as if they do not Matter, the lives of human beings everywhere are threatened and so all should rally in support of Black Lives in the interest of humanity. It is not an act of charity when others support Black Lives Matter.
Recommended Citation
Agozino, Biko
(2018)
"Black Lives Matter Otherwise All Lives Do Not Matter,"
African Journal of Criminology and Justice Studies: Vol. 11:
Iss.
1, Article 1.
Available at:
https://digitalscholarship.tsu.edu/ajcjs/vol11/iss1/1
