It's Safe to Murder Negroes

“They hate him that upholds justice…they detest him who speaks the truth.  Though you have built stone mansions, you will not live in them.  For I know how many are your offenses and how great your sins.”

-          Amos 5:10-12

Just 1 day after the release of Fruitvale Station; hours after George Zimmerman was acquitted for the murder of Trayvon Martin, I come to you with my heart heavy - extremely disgusted and disappointed, but not altogether surprised.  Whenever I counsel a woman or young lady regarding a dysfunctional relationship, I start with one solid truth – you train people how to treat you.  The Black community is in a dysfunctional relationship with a bastard country that took us hostage centuries ago and is continually forcing us to endure the forfeiture of rights that they never intended to give us. 

We can say that the Martin-Zimmerman case wasn’t about race, and in some ways, it wasn’t.  It was about race simply because the murdered party was a black child, but the Martin-Zimmerman case is about far more than that.  It’s about the truth.  Actor David Banner is quoted as saying, “the message is clear, if young black men make me feel uncomfortable, I’ll kill ‘em”.   

It is no secret that I have long admired Mr. Banner.  I have also never kept secret my deep admiration for Dr. Vernon Johns.  Tonight the parallels between those two, and many others, became dramatically clear.  The quote of Mr. Banner’s mentioned above [at least for me] directly mimics a sentiment addressed by Dr. Johns 64 years ago – “It’s Safe to Murder Negroes”!

While reverend of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church (immediately preceding Dr. King), Rev. Johns was incessantly vocal about the plight of blacks in America and his belief that America was not all to blame for the second-class status of African Americans.  Tonight I express my agreement with that belief.  It does not matter what level of dysfunction your relationship has reached, you train people how to treat you, and America continues to treat Blacks in the fashion in which we have trained them to do so.

Beginning in the summer of 1949, Dr. Johns' biography reports a number of deaths to which we have witnessed disturbing parallels in recent years.  "There was a period of particularly harsh repression, with almost every week the police were killing blacks, particularly on Saturday nights.  A poor black man was shot down in the street just below Vernon Johns' church one Saturday evening. Everyone in Montgomery knew that he had been killed by a white man, but there was no serious investigation by local authorities, and it was clear that the killing was to be swept under the rug like so many other such killings over the years. The black leadership in the community grumbled behind closed doors. . . no public protest was voiced . . . with one exception. The following week Vernon posted on the bulletin board outside his church this sermon topic: It’s Safe to Murder Negroes."

How many times has a woman been beaten by a man only to find that when she garners the strength to fight back, the abuse ends?  How long will it take Black America to stand up to the country that is abusing us?

In 1952 in Montgomery, a white bus driver and a black man named Brooks, exchanged words over the driver accusing Brooks of not having paid his fare.  The driver called the police, and when the police came, they shot and killed Brooks as he got off the bus. Some blacks argued that Brooks had gotten "out of his place" with the white bus driver.

That was in 1952.  On New Year’s Day 2009, Oscar Grant III was shot in the back by a police officer while being restrained; face down on an Oakland subway platform after police were called to the scene in response to a fight.  He would die the next morning. 

In May 1949, during what some refer to as “The Bloody Spring”, a white man on his porch saw a black man running down the street. The white man went in to get his double-barreled shotgun and shot the black man dead in the street. The killer's explanation: "If he was running, he must have done something."

That was the second week of May in 1949.  On February 26, 2012, Sanford, Florida 911 receives a call from George Zimmerman regarding “a real suspicious guy, [who] looks like he's up to no good or he's on drugs or something.  It's raining, and he's just walking around."  The “suspicious guy”, 17-year old Trayvon Martin would also be approached, pursued, and murdered.

Somehow, when I was young and my grandmother told me that history repeats itself…I don’t think this is what she meant!  In the biographical film, The Road to Freedom: The Vernon Johns Story, Rev. Johns speaks of a friend – “Brother Hill found a cause worth dying for…I envy him.  God never said, thou shalt not kill unless you are a police officer.  He most certainly didn’t say thou shalt not kill unless you are white!  Last week, a white man was fined for shooting a rabbit out of season,” but more than 60 years after Dr. Johns gave this sermon, it is still “Safe to Murder Negroes”, and just like back then, it’s safe to murder negroes, because negroes stand by and let it happen.  The only way to end an abusive relationship is to stand up to your abuser.  Just as silence is recognized as a form of communication, NO action is recognized as a form of reaction.  When will Black America decide that we’re tired of taking this lying down?

For footage of the Oscar Grant III Shooting or Dr. Johns’ Sermon “It’s Safe to Murder Negroes”, please see below.  My next 2 posts will be on “Stand Your Ground” states and the instances that have trained America to mistreat Black Americans.

Follow Me as I Follow God.

-          @RevealingRuth

Safe to Murder Negroes    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p65GE9Lure4

Oscar Grant Shooting     http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bmJukcFzEX4