Do Black Lives Matter When They Are Alive?
Mar 08, 2022Black children get snatched from their homes every day, but does anyone care? We’ve seen the protests sparked by the murder of George Floyd. We’ve heard the cries for justice when officers get off clean or get a slap on the wrist for inflicting harm in our communities. And the smartest among us write books and articles detailing the numbers of injustices and discrepancies we face as Black people in America, but it seems that we - world and community around us - only hold the spotlight on Black people when they are dead - after all the harm, abuse, and terror has been inflicted already, which forces me to ask -
Do Black Lives Matter when they are alive?
Social media spreads all kinds of information: news, sports, trends, pop culture, and gossip, but news about the daily abduction of Black children gets little attention. Thankfully, we do have some people on the ground, in our communities, that spread the news about tens of thousands of abducted, missing, and trafficked Black children. Typically, we only know or see their faces when they’ve gone missing, either by individual criminal kidnapping or perhaps a medical issue where they’ve gone lost. Still, there’s a kidnapping that occurs every day that most aren’t aware of, and that’s the kidnapping by the government - the state - Child Protective Services (CPS).
This kidnapping of our Black children by the state is yet another tentacle of the monster of American colonization. Since slavery, Black families have been separated and torn apart, left to patchwork the pieces of their culture, history, dignity, and families. CPS is supposed to protect children, but this organization is filled with corruption, child abuse, and abduction. The scary part is this: most people have no clue this is occurring, and the most heartbreaking part is that it has been allowed to go on for long without a fight from the Black community.
We are fighting for our lives - our Black Lives that Matter - and the lives of our families and the soul of our community. CPS corruption is nationwide; when you look at where most child removals (legal kidnappings) occur, it’s in Black low-income communities. Black families in low-income communities’ face state-sanctioned police violence, state-approved colonization via gentrification, state-supported family disruption, and legal kidnapping through CPS. This CPS crisis in our society is the catastrophic intersection of the big benefit of breaking up Black families and communities and the big business of financial corruption through state agencies. These cases of financial corruption, kidnapping, CPS intimidation, and threats have been documented in investigative studies and also personal accounts from the people who experience this themselves. There’s a lot we can do, but we must first be aware of the crisis at hand, and then, most importantly, we must speak out and support the organizations on the ground in the fight for our Black children, families, and community.
We march and protest when Black people are murdered, raise money for the victims and their families, and give money every Sunday to the church. Still, little attention or resources are provided to organizations that fight the “legal” or state-sanctioned kidnapping of our Black children. If we aren’t going to protect and save our own Black children and keep our families and communities together in this centuries-long fight against American colonization - then who will?
We are there in the community - with the people - fighting the good fight, and we could use your help and support. Visit Our Website for more information on our organization and how to support it. You can invest in the movement, and you can also purchase Merch, wear it proudly and let everyone know that you are against this insidious form of state-sanctioned violence.
