Are black male lives valued less?

When I heard the story of Michael Brown the narrative sounded all too familiar. Young black unarmed male killed by a white police officer. Being from the UK parts of this story immediately reminded me of Mark Duggan. In both cases the unarmed victim was shot and killed by a police officer and there were peaceful protests as a result. However this led to some people rioting and looting.

The role of the police is to serve and protect its citizens but it seems that in the USA especially if you are black and male it is the police that you rather need protecting from. What has shocked me is the excessive military style force used by the police in Ferguson towards the predominantly peaceful protesters. They used tear gas, stun grenades and rubber bullets indiscriminately. There is footage of the police throwing tear gas at the Aljazeera media team. Why would they attack journalists? They obviously do not want people to record their actions for the world to see. The small suburb of Ferguson with roughly 21,000 residents looks like a war zone with racial tensions brewing. About 67% of the residents are black while 29% are white. However only 3 of the the 53 police officers are black.

R.I.P Mike

Michael brown was an 18 year old male who had no previous criminal convictions. He graduated from High School and was days away from starting College (University). His school teachers described him as someone who didn't cause trouble. There are different eye witness accounts to the circumstances surrounding his death but it is a fact that he was shot six times with the fatal shot being a bullet to his skull. Many of the witnesses say that Brown was facing the police with his hands up to surrender but Darren Wilson (the police officer) continued to shoot. What I can't understand is why an officer would continue to shoot multiple times at someone who is surrendering. The fact that Michaels body was lying in the street in broad daylight for 4 hours with no ambulance being called is disgraceful.

There is a campaign called "dont shoot" with many people including celebrities and people all over the world holding up their hands in honour of Michael Brown. Another campaign that has arisen is a hashtag on twitter #iftheygunnedmedown what photo would they choose? Young people show contrasting pictures of themselves, one where they may be in a hoodie/drinking/smoking/partying etc and the second picture is in a more professional light such as being at work/in a suit or their graduation picture. This is to show how the media portrays black victims by using a picture that may make the person be  perceived in a negative light instead of the more positive picture. It seems that the media like to assassinate the characters of black victims by bringing up negative things about their past to make it seem that they deserved to be killed. With Michael Brown they bought up the fact that he stole cigars from a store by releasing CCTV images and it has also been said that he allegedly had weed in his system. But how does this justify him being murdered? Yet the media do not bring up anything negative about the policeman. Whats even worse is that almost a quarter of a million dollars has been raised by people in support of Darren Wilson and he is on PAID administrative leave.

It is extremely disgraceful that in this day and age things like this happen. It seems that the Ku Klux Klan that had terrorized black people in the past have a new face - The police (I'm not saying that every single police officer is a racist but there are a lot that are).  I'm reminded of the cases of Trayvon Martin and Eric Garner. The sad thing about these cases is that despite the evidence none of their killers have been convicted of murder. I have doubts that Darren Wilson will be convicted of Michaels murder. Some people may argue that black people also kill black people but nothing is said unless a white person kills a black person. This seems true but that is another topic. Though race plays a key part in this story it shouldn't be about 'black v white' but it should be about humans being treated and valued as humans. It should be about justice. Police brutality against ANY race is wrong!  People should not have to live in fear of being killed by the police. Police shouldn't be abusing their power, they shouldn't be above the law because like the rest of us they are people too and should be punished for committing crimes .

*Images of Ferguson