A day after the Trayvon Martin hoodie rally is over, a question that is on my mind is what will happen next? After so many hundreds of people band together to show solidarity in acknowledging that the death of Trayvon Martin is an atrocity, what will those people do next? What else will they do to help ensure that justice is reached?Probably just talk.
A few of them may hold on to their anger about the situation a little bit longer. They may even sign the petition. But the majority are just going to post pictures of themselves wearing a hoodie on Facebook, take pictures with their friends of them all wearing hoodies, or contribute to the water cooler conversation about how they were in the march when they get back to work or school Monday.
This will, unfortunately, end up being another situation like that of Troy Davis. You remember, Troy Davis, the black man that was executed a few months back. Don't you remember hearing how outraged people were the week of his execution? Didn't you see people listen to the radio or watch the news when the execution became official? And what happened after that?
Absolutely nothing-just more talk.
My point is this-where is action? Where are the families taking the law into their hands and making people accountable? I had not heard about the New Black Libertarian Militia suggested to make a citizens arrest of Trayvon Martin's killer but is that not a good idea? I can see how it may be considered "messy" by some, but could it still not be done? It is going to be messy, regardless of who takes the initiative to do it, but it still must be done! No one should complain that the killer is not behind bars when people who have the power to make that happen won't do anything. If the person who threw flour on Kim Kardashian can elicit a citizens arrest, why can no one arrest this killer?
Fear. The answer, unfortunately, is fear. I take that back-its fear and laziness. People are more concerned that they will suffer some kind of way and less concerned with doing the right thing. People are also invested in a system that has people take care of situations like this so that they will not have to be involved. This is what buying into the dream of the Civil Rights movement in the United States has brought black people-another dream. It's a dream that we have better jobs, better houses, and a better education. We sold ourselves short. In exchange for this dream, black people gave the system closer access to them. It is easier now to harass people-they want to be harassed in exchange for the job. They'll put up with it as long as they're getting paid. It is easier now to imprison black people-black people want the things they we tell them they can't have. We'll convince them they can work hard for it but at the same time, we'll make it hard for them to get and they will get frustrated and try to find an illegal way to get it (and we've created the law which makes it illegal, too). We'll take them out of the fields and put them into our offices where we can still make a profit off of them and take advantage of their labor but as long as they get some trinkets here and there (a paycheck every two weeks), they will be none the wiser.
What am I getting at? Stop aiding the system. It does not do anything except keep you on a short leash. Don't ask for accountability-make people accountable. Don't expect someone else to do something that you are more than able to do yourself. Maybe I am not going to buy a plane ticket to Florida and conduct a citizens arrest of Trayvon Martin's killer but maybe I am planting seeds of wisdom to make whomever reads this see the prison that they live in for what it is-a prison-and convince them to take some action to break out of it. Your action against the system may prevent the killing of another Trayvon Martin.
