T.W. violence, abuse.
The law in most countries is skewed to favour the perpetrator.
Other than when you are dead, any act of violence against you has to be proven by you, the victim.
While I understand that people, especially famous powerful people can become victims of scams and false allegations, according to research conducted, those cases are few and far between.
In the case of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, as harsh as it may sound, there are bodies to “prove” something bad happened to them. That they were murdered. In this country, people like the late Collins Khosa, who was brutally murdered by army personnel during the lockdown, it seems that a dead body isn’t enough.
Witnesses who testified that he was innocently drinking a beer in his house is not enough to sway the authorities to take action against those that killed him. The authorities want to know what he did prior to being killed. Short of video evidence detailing his movements from the time he woke up, it’s doubtful that his wife and family will have the closure they seek. It is after all only a black body and there’s much more of those around.
Black people like the ones that I have mentioned don’t matter. Bodies lying in a mortuary is not enough evidence that somehow the victim didn’t “provoke” the punishment meted out on them even if they were asleep at the time like Breonna Taylor.
The burden to prove their innocence is in their lifeless bodies. The secrets they had or illegal life they lived before they were murdered matters.
Somehow, society has become immune to murder. Let me rephrase that, somehow, society has become immune to black people being murdered. The belief that black and brown people live violent lives makes their murder justifiable.
We have vast amounts of monies being spent trying to find who abducted and killed Madeleine McCann but we have no resources available when it comes to video footage of black people being killed. Not that I am in any way, shape, or form excusing Madeleine’s abduction.
A part of me does feel somehow that we as a society are more forgiving of white people’s crimes and definitely do not blame them when they are victims of crimes.
The violent narrative of black and brown people being tougher, able to endure more physically and emotionally is wrong.
Black and brown people have had no choice based on colonialism, slavery, and Apartheid to suffer violent torture or death and discursive racism in media continues to report just how much suffering was self-inflicted. Even if as in Breonna’s instance, they are asleep, the questions will still arise about what she did before she fell asleep or in her life as a whole.
Unlike violent mass murderers and racist police officers, these three people, to name but a few were innocent and did not deserve what happened to them. But as investigations continue, if there are investigations, it would seem that the investigations are more about trying to discover faults and failings in the victim’s life than finding evidence of homicide. Investigators are more interested in delving into the victim’s past than delving into the perpetrator’s past.
This should be indicative of a society that doesn’t care about black lives and definitely not the black lives that were taken by white people.
Black on black crime seems more acceptable than white on black because, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary of white people being violent all through the centuries, that news remains archived and only the black victims lying in their own blood, needs to provide enough evidence to vindicate themselves.
What happened to everyone is equal before the law?
What happened to evidence that is readily available that can be used to arrest criminals of these crimes?
I’ll tell you what happened, the burden of proof has shifted to the black and brown victim and because they are no longer alive, they can’t speak for themselves so justice if any is delayed or denied.
