MountainMornings

I’m still in Nashville, in a sort of toddler-enforced news blackout. But I did catch something about the NYPD turning their backs on Mayor DeBlasio at one of the slain officer’s funeral yesterday. And that just got to me. Granted I don’t know what the Mayor said to deserve the back-turning, the lack of respect. Still, this has now gone too far imho. And when I read Chris Rock’s reply on Twitter, I understood why.

“Maybe the NYPD can use their newfound love of back-turning the next time they see a dark skinned man walking the street doing nothing wrong.”

Now you know he will be getting flak for saying this, his publicist will be doing cartwheels trying to fix it, and he’ll most likely lose some revenue by boycotting white people…but, he’s so dead on. Because maybe our kids can walk around with a BB gun in suburbia and not worry about being shot. Because our kids might get picked up for walking around at night, with a Snickers bar, but they will be delivered to our homes with a wink and a nod from local cops who know us.

We are at a turning point here, and it doesn’t have to do with #BlackLivesMatter or #BlueLivesMatter. How about #ALL LIVES MATTER? Black, brown, white, grey, blue, chartreuse….ochre even? In no other country are so many people killed in such great numbers by their own police force! And in this secular humanist’s opinion, it’s all the GUNS in our society that is the major contributing factor.

No police officer – black, white or brown – will ever be the same after shooting a youngster he thought was threatening, but was found to be unarmed. He or she will carry that fatal mistake on their soul forever.

When it’s extremely hard to acquire guns, and the police force doesn’t carry guns, guess what? Murdering our children in the street will come to an abrupt end. Beginning to de-militarize our police is a good start, and declawing the NRA – getting their blood money out of the hands of our elected officials has got to be next.

If I knew how to do that I’d win the Nobel Peace Prize. But continuing to turn our backs on mayors, on our children, on jury duty, on voting; and not voting out the NRA sympathizers is using twisted logic. The Bride interned for the Children’s Defense Fund in DC one year. They are instrumental in promoting #Childrens Lives Matter. http://www.childrensdefense.org

We turn our backs on a toddler’s temper tantrum. Not on this type of apartheid in our midst.