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WASHINGTON Lawmakers in 14 states have introduced at least 32 bills proposing that members of law enforcement be included in hate crime protections like those received by people of color, religious minorities and members of the LGBTQ community since the beginning of the year, according to an analysis of state legislatures by The Huffington Post.

Last year, Louisiana became the first state to loop law enforcement into its state hate crime statue, with its so-called Blue Lives Matter bill. Several states soon followed. The Mississippi state Senateadvanced a similar billon Jan. 26, and theKentucky House of Representatives advanced its own version on Feb. 13.

Most of the bills arent that successful. At least 20 of the bills introduced over the past year died by vote or at the end of the congressional session after being referred to a state legislative committee. Twenty-two are currently sitting in a committee for review, including in South Carolina, which doesnt even have a hate crime statute on the books. A bill in Tennessee was withdrawn.

The wave of legislation exposes an appetite to provide political sanctuary to an already protected class. Including police officers in hate crime statutes is legally redundant, or even counterproductive, creating deeper divisions between police and the communities they serve. All 50 states, according to the Anti-Defamation League, have statutes that automatically increase the penalties for violent attacks on police.

And, unlike hate crime laws, they dont require prosecutors to prove motive.

In the vast majority of states, you will get life or considerably less in prison for murder; but if you murder a police officer, you are almost certain to get death, said Mark Potok, a senior fellow at the Southern Poverty Law Center. So the truth is that including police in hate crime laws is merely a political statement and an unnecessary one at that.

Spencer Platt via Getty Images

A lone gunmanshot NYPD Officers Wenjian Liu and Rafael Ramos at point-blank rangeas they sat in their squad car on Dec. 14, 2014. The shooter, Ismaaiyl Brinsley, had set out to avenge the death of Eric Garner, a 43-year-old black father of six who died after being placed in an chokehold by NYPD Officer Daniel Pantaleo that July.

Video of police pinning Garner to the ground went viral and exposed the strained relationships between police and the black community. The shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, that August increased the focus onthe Black Lives Matter movement and police violence including scrutiny overthe high rates at which black people are killed by police.

The national focus on police violence has put officers and their more avid supporters on the defense. Supporters created the Blue Lives Matter campaign as a direct response to the Black Lives Matter movement and the growing protests against police violence. The campaign gained steam after the deaths of Liu and Ramos. By January 2015, Chuck Canterbury, the national president of the Fraternal Order of Police, released a statement advocating for the inclusion of police in hate crime statutes.

Congress saw a need to expand the law to protect a group of our fellow citizens who we suspected were being targeted as victims of violence, Canterbury said. In the last few years, ambush attacks aimed to kill or injure law enforcement officers have risen dramatically. Nineteen percent of the fatalities by firearm suffered by law enforcement in 2014 were ambush attacks.

Enough is enough! he said. Its time for Congress to do something to protect the men and women who protect us.

Former President Barack Obama signed the Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu National Blue Alert Act of 2015 into law that May. The legislation implemented national Blue Alerts, similar to Amber Alerts, that warned of attacks on police officers and would help track down the assailants who carried them out.

They were serving their community with great honor and dedication and courage, and all of New York grieved and all of the nation grieved, Obama said during the signing ceremony. Its important for us not only to honor their memory, its also important for us to make sure that we do everything we can to help ensure the safety of our police officers when theyre in the line of duty.

Despite the effort, the so-called War on Cops continued to fester as aggrieved communities pushed back against police killings of unarmed black people. Both protesters and police werehurt in clashes. But things came to a head on Aug. 28, 2015, when Texas Deputy Darren Goforth was ambushed and shot in the back of the head as he put gas in his patrol vehicle. The Harris County Sheriffs Department told HuffPost that the alleged shooter, Shannon J. Miles, had a many motives, but that Goforth was targeted in part because of his status as a police officer.

[Goforths murder] was certainly part of the impetus for pursuing hate crimes legislation, said Jim Pasco, senior adviser to the president of the Fraternal Order of the Police.

But while the FOP hasrenewed its 10-year-old calls for police to be included in hate crime statutes, detractors of Black Lives Matter have used the race of the alleged shooter who is black to try to undermine the movement.

Conservative media pundits promoted the Blue Lives Matter campaign as it gained traction following the heavily publicized attacks on police officers.

Fox & Friends co-host Elisabeth Hasselbeck wondered on air why Black Lives Matter wasnt classified as a hate group. An on-screen banner ran by the network called Black Lives Matter a Murder Movement. And Bill OReilly asked a criminal justice expert if the movement was to blame for the murders of police officers. Republicans added Obama to the list of those culpable, arguing that he and BLM activists were stoking violence against officers with their calls for reform.

By the timefive Dallas police officers were gunned down in July 2016, five bills to incorporate police into hate crime statutes had been proposed. One of those, in Louisiana, had been signed into law. In March 2016, Republicans introduced afederal bill in the House. It died in committee at the end of the 114th Congress.

There have always been individuals in the United States with an inclination to perpetrate unprovoked attacks against police officers merely because theyre police officers, out of hatred, Pasco said. And that type of violence, incidentally, is growing at exponential rates.

Despite these high-profile shootings and the push to make violent attacks on police officers a hate crime, on-duty officers are safer today than they were in the 1980s. The FBI declared 2015 one of the safest years on record for police. And, though the official numbers for 2016 wont be available until mid-2017, the unofficial total of 64officers who were feloniously killed would be significantly below a peak of 134 in 1973.

The small spike in ambushes and killings may be backlash to the deaths of unarmed civilians, but this is hardly a long term trend, says Jack Levin, a criminologist at Northeastern University.

Police officers are doing better as victims of crime than they have for many decades, Levin said. This is, hopefully, a short-term blip and not a trend. If we see that the number of ambushes of police officers continues to rise, then it may be worth taking another look at the possibility of including them in hate crime laws.

Chip Somodevilla via Getty Images

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This interpretation is dangerous: Cops can use charges of resisting arrest tojustify excessive forceand cover upabusive behavior.Videos of police brutality commonly include officers shouting stop resisting! as they pummel a defenseless and not resisting victim. Charges of resisting arrest or assaulting an officer often follow.

Any legislation for a Blue Lives Matter bill seeks to instill intimidation and fear, said Mike Lowe, a Black Lives Matter activist in San Antonio. These protections make it easy to silence the voices of those seeking justice and accountability. I will not be silenced by it. All we want is justice and accountability, and law enforcement officers must be held accountable.

The current nationwide push for Blue Lives Matter bills misinterprets these calls for police accountability and reform, said Shelby Chestnut, the director of community organizing and public advocacy with The New York City Anti-Violence Project.

These movements to hold police accountable are not about targeting individuals, but theyre targeting a system that is highly trained, highly weaponized, and has a great deal of power over some of the most marginalized communities that exist in society, she said.

These marginalized communities are often home to the protected classes that depend on the justice system.Over 7,100 people were victims of hate crimes in 2015, according to the most recent data from the FBI.

Most of them were attacked because of their race, religion, or some other immutable characteristic.

There are many situations in which a police officer might be injured or killed in the line of duty. Sadly, that is just part of the job, but it has nothing to do with hate or bias, said Levin, the professor of criminology. The bottom line is that treating any act of violence against the police as hate-motivated only dilutes the meaning of hate crimes.

Alissa Scheller designed the chart tracking the legislation.

Did we miss anything? If you know of any state bills not included here that seek to make attacks on police officers a hate crime, submit them using this awesome Google form!

Read more:
32 Blue Lives Matter Bills Have Been Introduced Across 14 States This Year - Huffington Post

Patrisse Khan-Cullors and two friends are founders of the Black Lives Matter movement. She sees the movement going forward with renewed focus, and building political power. Courtesy of Patrisse Khan-Cullors hide caption

Patrisse Khan-Cullors and two friends are founders of the Black Lives Matter movement. She sees the movement going forward with renewed focus, and building political power.

It's been five years since the death of Trayvon Martin and the outrage that sparked the Black Lives Matter movement.

Martin 17 years old, black and unarmed was shot by George Zimmerman, a neighborhood watch volunteer in Sanford, Fla.

Zimmerman was charged with second-degree murder and manslaughter. He claimed self-defense, and was later acquitted.

After the verdict, there were demonstrations and an emotional Facebook post by an activist named Alicia Garza.

It read, in part: "Black people. I love you. I love us. Our lives matter."

That phrase was streamlined by her friend, Patrisse Khan-Cullors, and with the help of a third friend, Opal Tometi, "black lives matter" became a hashtag, a rallying cry and eventually a protest movement that gained steam after police killed Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo.

Since then, much has changed, Khan-Cullors tells NPR's Audie Cornish.

"In that moment, it wasn't popular to be in the streets. It wasn't a part of the mainstream dialogue," she says. "What we've seen over the last five years is the popularization of protest and the willingness of both media but also Hollywood to talk about Black Lives Matter unapologetically."

On whether the movement would have benefited from focusing on a single policy issue

The movement is a decentralized one. Many different people across the country are entering from different angles. We're not looking for one fix-it policy. We're taking on our mayors, our chiefs of police, our sheriffs and our DAs. We're looking at the entire system and the ways that it can transform itself so that we can actually see a world where black lives matter. And I think it's been incredibly effective.

On whether Donald Trump's election felt like a rebuke

I'll say this: Whenever black people say enough is enough, we are often up against white nationalism. And so what this election showed us is our movement became too powerful and that white nationalism although (it) has always existed took power again.

On Trump's voter base

There are people who are white racists and identify as such. And there are people who are well-meaning white people who also voted for Trump. There also are a significant amount of people of color who voted for Trump. And I think we have to consider what kind of conditions allowed for people who actually believe in American democracy to vote for a Trump.

On what lies ahead for the movement in the Trump era

I see us moving forward with a renewed focus. We have to defend and protect our communities, but we also have to build a long-term strategy to ensure that those who are most at the margins, that we'll actually be able to build real political power.

To hear more of this interview, click on the audio button.

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Black Lives Matter Finds 'Renewed Focus' 5 Years After Trayvon Martin - NPR

Department of Religious Studies professor Matthew Cressler will discuss religion and the Black Lives Matter movement during the College of Charleston Faculty Lecture Series at Addlestone Library this week.

Matthew Cressler

The free lecture at noon on March 1, 2017, in room 227 of the library is co-sponsored by the Friends of the Library and the Honors College.

The Black Lives Matter movement is often characterized as different than the civil rights movement, says Cressler. That difference is often qualified in the terms of religion, with Black Lives Matter being described as more secular than the civil rights movement.

Cressler says that secular title is often used to try to delegitimize Black Lives Matter in the same way the secular label was placed on the Black Power movement in the 1970s.

He says his talk will challenge those arguments.

The College Todayrecently asked Cressler about Black Lives Matter:

There have been comparisons between Black Lives Matter and the civil rights movement. Is it fair to compare the two?

Yes, it is, to the extent that Black Lives Matter is the most recent example of ongoing black struggles for freedom and justice that date back to the time of slavery. Moreover, Black Lives Matter is the most prominent black social movement since the civil rights and Black Power movements of the mid-20th century.

The movement is different, of course, to the extent that it grows out of new social, political, and cultural circumstances. For instance, Black Lives Matter, among its many objectives, is working to challenge and dismantle mass incarceration which arose largely after the fall of Jim Crow. However, other issues, such as police brutality, are continuous with concerns raised in the civil rights movement. Black Lives Matter also differentiates itself from civil rights era protests in a number of tactical ways for instance, their explicitly feminist and queer leadership challenges traditionally charismatic male-centered leadership of previous generations. However, their commitment to direct action protest would stand in continuity with the civil disobedience of the 1950s, 60s and 70s. The Rev. William Barber calls this time period the third Reconstruction, connecting this historical moment to two previous turning points in the fight for black freedom (post-Civil War Reconstruction and the civil rights era) but noting that they are distinct in important ways too.

Do you think the civil rights movement would have grown without the religious element?

The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. would not have been the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. without his Christian faith. Malcolm X would not have been Malcolm X without his Muslim faith. Angela Davis would not be Angela Davis without her Marxist and existentialist philosophy. Fannie Lou Hamer would not have been Fannie Lou Hamer without her Pentecostal faith. Bob Moses would not have been Bob Moses without his connection to the reading of Albert Camus. Bayard Rustin would not have been Bayard Rustin without his Quaker beliefs.

Inasmuch as all of these people were motivated and inspired to action because of these beliefs, religion is an essential element of the civil rights movement. At the same time, we should be careful not to essentialize the movement as exclusively religious, given that many key figures (and activists in the movement) were motivated by decidedly secular beliefs.

Black Lives Matter is often called more secular than the civil rights movement. Is that the case?

If by secular we mean non-religious or anti-religious, then no. Black Lives Matter is differently religious it does not grow directly out of black Christian institutions, nor is it led by black male ministers (it was three women, two of whom identify as queer, who coined #BlackLivesMatter, and they are religious, though not in traditionally Christian ways). Importantly, though, there are many black Christians who are active members in The Movement for Black Lives, and the movement has inspired and energized black Christians. Just as the civil rights movement had widespread religious diversity, so too Black Lives Matter is composed of supporters and activists from many religious and secular communities.

Though the term secular is helpful in some ways for instance, in signaling the way that hip hop anthems such asKendrick Lamars Alright have served as the chorus to young activists in the way that explicitly Christian hymns did in the civil rights movement it is often used to delegitimize the protest of black millennials who dont play by the rules of an earlier generation of activists. This attempt to use religion (or lack thereof) to delegitimize black protest has historical precedent this is precisely what was said of the Black Power movement of the 1970s which was said to have put the Gospel on the back burner in spite of the fact that it was led in many regards by black Muslims and it was taken up by a wide variety of black religious communities.

How do you see the role of Black Lives Matter in the current political climate?

The Movement for Black Lives is at the forefront of a number of different social justice movements that are working to transform our society. Id also include the fight against the Dakota Access Pipeline, led by Native Americans along with their allies; Latin activists fighting attempts to demonize and deport immigrants; and Muslim activists fighting against Islamophobia and the recent immigration ban.

In short, the Black Lives Matter movement is but one (perhaps the most prominent) example of historically marginalized communities leading the fight against injustice in our country today.

Link:
Religious Studies Professor Examines Black Lives Matter Movement

ANALYSIS/OPINION:

Black History Month which is meant to celebrate achievements made within the African-American community has morphed into the Black Lives Matter movement in many public schools.

Earlier this month, the entire school district in Rochester, New York, designated a Black Lives Matter day to celebrate the citys diversity.

We want people to acknowledge and respect one item, one part of what makes America great, which is the black community, Van White, the Rochester school board president, told the local Time Warner Cable News. The whole idea is to understand the struggles that black folks have in this country. If people dont respect your life as an African-American, Latino, Italian, that will raise obstacles for you.

Mr. White and the school board maintained their decision to celebrate the day had no affiliation with the national Black Lives Matter movement, yet by merely naming the day Black Lives Matter, it is politically charged that western society systemically and institutionally discriminates against people of color. That lady justices scale is tipped against them, and shes not blind.

In Illinois, 220 students at DeKalb High School, decided to stay at home after a Black History Month assembly led to racially charged exchanges and rumors about threats against the school, according to the Daily Chronicle.

Two sophomores recited the poem Angry Black Women, at the assembly, which includes racially charged lines like Im mad because the system is built for the white man. Im mad because white women fetishize our black men or refuse to acknowledge our Black Lives Matter and Mad because Black Lives Matter is corrected to All Lives Matter by White America who feels threatened by us.

Parents were only notified of the performance after it went viral, and school Superintendent Doug Moeller admitted the school shouldve been more diligent in reviewing what content was presented. A rap song titled I cant breathe was also performed.

I dont think [the high school administration] did their due diligence in terms of reviewing the skits and the songs that were going to be presented, Mr. Moeller told the Chronicle after the uproar. Again, I didnt find them offensive, but I can understand how some of our students might find them offensive, just given the race relationships in this town.

In North Texas, a Black History Month performance also took a political tone, offending the towns police chief.

During an assembly this month, students held up signs reading Black Lives Matter, I cant breathe, and The whole system is guilty.

Allowing this only promotes the discontent and hatred for police to continue. Its a bad day, Police Chief Mike Broadnax told his local CBS News.

According to the local television station, Principal Michael Bland emailed the schools staff and called the highly politicized message an unfortunate event.

See the original post:
Black History Month morphs into Black Lives Matter month in many public schools - Washington Times

A new musical work by pianist and composer Jon Jang, and in collaboration with poet performer Amanda Kemp, "Can't Stop Cryin' for America! (Black Lives Matter)," will make its world premiere this year as part of the 30th anniversary season of Asian Improv aRts.

The work memorializes African Americans "killed by the police and/or white supremacists" in 2014 and 2015, according to Jang, while making connections to the history of legal lynching, institutional racism, and African American and Asian American alliances.

"As a U.S. artist and citizen, I support Black Lives Matter and the rights of immigrants of color to live a life of equality in our country," Jang told NBC News. "We need to reject confusing statements such as 'All Lives Matter' and 'We Are Immigrants' because [they do] not address the history of institutional racism and exclusionary laws that have destroyed or nearly destroyed families of color in our country."

RELATED: Composer Debuts Song Honoring Dim Sum Workers Two Years After $4 Million Settlement

One vignette, "More Motherless Children," is based on the African-American spiritual, "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child," and memorializes the six women and three men killed in 2015 by an avowed white supremacist at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina.

Another vignette, "Say Her Name: Sandra Bland!" expresses the defiance of the young woman who was found hanging in a jail cell in Waller County, Texas, after she was pulled over for a traffic stop.

Others remembered in the work include Eric Garner, John Crawford III, Michael Brown, Laquan McDonald, Tamir Rice, Freddie Gray, and Emmet Till.

Recalling the early support of African-American legislators for Japanese-American redress and reparations in the 1980s, Jang continued, "It is important to continue to support black/Asian alliances with other people of color and white progressives to form a broad coalition as we celebrate Black History Month and memorialize Day of Remembrance [Feb. 19, the anniversary of the signing of Executive Order 9066] for Japanese Americans."

The Jon Jangtet will perform Jon Jang's "Cryin' for America! (Black Lives Matter)" for its world premiere, June 2017. Photo by Bob Hsiang

Following performances last year of "Cryin' in America" as a work in progress, the world premiere will be performed by Jang, Kemp, and the Jon Jangtet Jang's music group at the Joe Henderson Lab at the SFJAZZ Center on June 18.

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Composer Jon Jang 'Can't Stop Cryin' for America' in New Black Lives Matter Tribute - NBCNews.com