This is Amerikkka
In Texas, Karmelo Anthony was convicted after acting in self-defense during a confrontation that ended in the death of a white teenager. The jury rejected his self-defense claim. In South Carolina, Rick Chow was acquitted after chasing and shooting 14-year-old Cyrus Carmack-Belton in the back, claiming he was defending his son. The jury accepted that defense
The legal facts of these cases are different. The circumstances are different. But the outcome leaves us asking the same question: Why does self-defense seem easier to recognize when the person pulling the trigger isn’t Black?
A Black teenager fearing for his life is seen as a criminal. A grown man who chases a Black child and shoots him in the back is seen as a reasonable citizen.
For generations, Black people have watched courts, juries, media outlets, and politicians extend the benefit of the doubt to others while denying it to us. We have watched Black children be treated as threats and Black victims be placed on trial after their deaths. Black fear is discounted, Black humanity is questioned, and Black lives are afforded less grace by a system that promises equal justice under the law.
Justice cannot be color-coded. Self-defense cannot depend on the race of the person making the claim. And equal protection under the law cannot remain a slogan that Black people in American never fully experience.