What has Black Lives Matter Accomplished?

Black Lives Matter (BLM) has been the catalyst of a LOT of social change, arguably for the better of society. It has forced a lot of uncomfortable conversations about race that some feel has been long overdue. Many BLM supporters are proud of their affiliation, seeing it as a 2.0 version of the Civil Rights Movement. In fact, the popularity of BLM has surpassed that of even the President of the United States. Still, despite their successes, the organization is mired in controversy. What some see as progress, others view as a destructive force dividing the nations. Whether you are for or against BLM, it is apparent that both sides are stubbornly resistant to the other side’s point of view.

And this had me thinking, “What if I put together a resource of arguments and factoids concerning BLM?” As I pondered further, I thought I could list the positive things that happened as a result of BLM and address some of the controversies. My goal is not to persuade people one way or the other. (Besides, it has been scientifically proven that trying to dissuade someone from their core belief system will likely cause them to double-down on them.) My intent is to share food for thought and spark debate over a group that is not going away anytime soon. Due to this easily offended culture we seem to be in, I will say now that I am not trying to trigger anyone. I am only sharing information for the curious and open-minded. In every case, I link to my source.

MY PERSONAL DISCLAIMER

Finally, I would ask any and all to see this as a springboard to their own research. PLEASE do your own research and come up with your own conclusions. You have a mind and an opinion, and you are entitled to it; just as I am. If at any point you think I am wrong in simply sharing what I found, I will save us both time by referring to this disclaimer, “You are right, and I am wrong.”

Now with that said, here are some bullet points for the TLDR (too long, did not read) crowd. This article is broken up in several sections.

  • Black Lives Matter to Black Liberation – I talk about the positive contributions and societal changes that BLM is credited for influencing.
  • Where do Black Lives Matter Donations Go? – I talk about the donations they receive and where the money goes.
  • BLM has a George Soros Connection – I share the connection BLM has to George Soros and the conspiracy theories surrounding that.
  • Black Lives Matter is Marxist Trained – The co-founder of BLM has admitted to being Marxist trained. What does that mean? I speculate.
  • BLM has terrorist roots – BLM has verified connections to the Weather Underground, a group the FBI declared to be domestic terrorist.
  • The Double Speak of “Defund the Police” – When people say “defund the police” it is interpreted differently by those who support BLM and their detractors. Why? I speculate.
  • Why Black Lives Matters Not All Lives Matter? – I discuss what I think is the animosity behind this phrase.

Black Lives Matter to Black Liberation

Not too long ago, the media was buzzing about a popularity poll that showed the public support of Black Lives Matter had reached new bounds. Here is a quote from Bloomberg.

From Washington to Whitefish, Montana, white America is reckoning with racism, publicly demonstrating its belief that black lives have been too long neglected and abused. There’s just one question: Why now?

According to a Civiqs poll, 53% of Americans support Black Lives Matter, and only 25% oppose it — a 12-point increase in support since mid-April. By a double-digit margin, BLM is more popular than either Donald Trump or Joe Biden. As political scientist Drew Linzer noted: BLM “is the single most favorably viewed national political organization or politician in America right now.”

Not surprising as for many supporters, the Black Lives Matter is the new Civil Rights movement and a chance to fight for social justice that some view is in the same vein as Martin Luther King, Jr and those who marched alongside him. Several reforms have been directly and indirectly with the BLM movement.

Here is a partial list.

 

Where do Black Lives Matter Donations Go?

Black Lives Matter has collected over $100 million for its cause with 200+ companies defending the protest actions of its supporters. Where does the money go? Some have said that millions of dollars was spent on travel and consultants, according to financial statements with 6% of that going to local chapters.

Some prominent voices have said that BLM is a money laundering operation for the Democratic National Convention whereas others consider that a hoax; some have upheld the position that it is.  If you look at the website, there is not much in terms of how they will specifically use donations to “fight for freedom, liberation and justice.”

In online forums, people often ponder anonymously what they hesitate to ask out loud. A certain online thread relates how several people have unsuccessfully tried to find out how their charitable donations would be spent. Included in the conversation was a link to an “Ask Me Anything” event where the Managing Director for Black Lives Matter Network Action Fund and Black Lives Matter Global Network, Inc. gave less than satisfying answers when probed about donations; apparently (according to Reddit members) some comments were deleted afterwards.

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BLM has a George Soros Connection

According to Wikipedia, George Soros is a Hungarian-American billionaire investor and philanthropist. As of May 2020, he had a net worth of $8.3 billion, having donated more than $32 billion to the Open Society Foundations. Quite recently, he announced a $220 million investment to fight racial injustice. People on the right, see him as a boogeyman, a self-admitted Nazi collaborator  wielding influence to destroy America and replace it with a one-word globalist government, or “open society.”

 

To quote ‘The Guardian’ – “Soros’s thought and philanthropic career are organised around the idea of the “open society,” a term developed and popularised by Popper in his classic work The Open Society and Its Enemies. According to Popper, open societies guarantee and protect rational exchange, while closed societies force people to submit to authority, whether that authority is religious, political or economic” and further down in the same article, “Unlike Gates, whose philanthropy focuses mostly on ameliorative projects such as eradicating malaria, Soros truly wants to transform national and international politics and society.

Whether or not his vision can survive the wave of antisemitic, Islamophobic and xenophobic rightwing nationalism ascendant in the US and Europe remains to be seen. What is certain is that Soros will spend the remainder of his life attempting to make sure it does.”

 

There are many conspiracy theories surrounding George Soros and while some news organizations dismiss them as myth at best or, far right propaganda at worst, alternative news stories persist about his desire and actions to demoralize and destroy America and reshape the world. How is this relevant? George Soros is a financial backer of Black Lives Matter among other causes. To many people – globally, his connection to BLM raises a HUGE red flag.

Further study:

Black Lives Matter is Marxist Trained

When writing The Communist Manifesto, Karl Marx thought he was providing a road to utopia, but everywhere his ideas were tried, they resulted in catastrophe and mass murder. How is this relevant? Black Lives Matter co-founder – Patrisse Cullors admits that she and fellow founder – Alicia Graza are trained Marxists.

https://twitter.com/BubetteS/status/1273628656447811584

That being said, what do Marxists believe? The website Classroom summarizes it like this.

Karl Marx, writing with Friedrich Engels, developed a theory of social and economic principles and a sharp critique of the capitalist form of government in the mid-1800s. Marx believed that workers, under the capitalist system of government, sold their labor and that this labor became a commodity. This commodity, or “labor power” translated into surplus value for the capitalist, but not for the worker. Marx concluded that this created an inherent conflict between the working class (proletariat) and the ownership class (the bourgeoisie). Because capitalism has this “built in” inequality, Marx argued that the working class would eventually take power over the ruling class, reconstructing society. This reconstruction would take place in stages. The next stage after capitalism, according to Marx, would be a socialist form of government.

Socialism advocates public ownership of property and natural resources rather than private ownership. The socialist system of government values cooperation over the competitiveness of a free market economy. Socialists believe that all people in society contribute to the production of goods and services and that those goods should be shared equally. This differs from the capitalist system in which individual efforts trump the collective and the free market determines the distribution of goods.  

That was classical Marxism. Marxism has evolved since its original inception into a neo-marxism that has replaced the rich vs poor dynamic with identity politics; something mostly associated with the “New Left.”  The Neo-Marxist is defined in the Urban Dictionary this way:

A neo-marxist is a person who adheres to neo-marxism. Neo-marxism is an offshoot of marxism, in which it is believed that all societal ills come from the divide between the rich (who are claimed to be undeserving of their wealth) and the poor (who are claimed to be oppressed). Marxists believe that all personal failings are of a direct result of someone else oppressing you, and that another person cannot be successful without oppressing another.

Neo-marxism differs from marxism by abandoning the dichotomy of rich vs poor and instead adopt identity politics. Instead of the dichotomy being between wealthy and poor, it is between successful and unsuccessful demographics. Neo-marxists divide all demographics (white, black, asian, male, female, gay, straight, etc) and place them in a hierarchy of oppression as determined by how successful that demographic is. White and Asian men are at the bottom of this hierarchy, whereas blacks and females are near the top (although the exact order is not widely accepted).

Neo-marxists believe that successful demographics are only successful because they exploit the less successful demographics, and as such believe that the more successful demographics (i.e the ‘rich’ of classical marxism) should be punished in some way, and what they have should be given to the less successful demographics. Typically this involves giving these demographics money, positions, and political influence simply for being a member of an “oppressed” demographic.

Consider a quote from a famous 20th century speech that is based on Marxist ideology. It was delivered by a very charismatic and political leader who was both revered and hated in his day. I left blanks so as not to give it away to any potential history buffs.

“The ________ have shown real genius in profiting by politics. This capitalistic people, which was brought into existence by the unscrupulous exploitation of men, has understood how to get the leadership of the Fourth Estate (the news media) into its own hands; and by acting both on the Right and on the Left it has its apostles in both camps. On the Right the ______ does his best to encourage all the evils there are to such an extent that the man of the people, poor devil, will be exasperated as much as possible– greed of money, unscrupulousness, hard- heartedness, abominable snobbishness. More and more ______ have wormed their way into our upper-class families; and the consequence has been that the ruling class has been alienated from its own people.”

Today, one could fill in the blank with “white man” or “conservative” or “Republican” and it would ring true to a lot of people today. Can you guess the speaker? It was Adolf Hitler. He said it in a speech, made in 1922. Add the word “jews” in the blanks and you will have the original speech. What does this suggest to you about Marxism? How can this ideology bring about an overall positive change to our society? Everywhere its been practiced, nothing good came from it.

Further study:

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Black Lives Matter Has Terrorist Roots

In an interview with Democracy Now, Black Lives Matter Co-Founder Patrisse Khan-Cullors credits Eric Mann for being her mentor. Eric Mann is a member of the Weather Underground, a radical-left militant  group that bombed government buildings and police stations in the 1960s and 1970s. Among their stated goals was the overthrow of the US government. In 1969, the FBI classified the group as a domestic terror organization. Mann was eventually charged with assault and battery, disturbing the peace, damaging property, defacing a building and disturbing a public assembly, for which he spent 18 months behind bars.

When the magazine – Cosmopolitan asked Cullors “What are some leaders that inspire you?” the response was Assata Shakur.  Shakur assassinated a New Jersey state trooper and now lives in exile in Cuba. She was also involved in bombings and several executions of cops in New Jersey, New York and San Francisco. She is still wanted by the FBI.  

Granted, being an inspiration can take on many meanings, but there is exists today a highly suspected connection to Black Lives Matter because of Susan Rosenberg. Susan Rosenberg, the vice-chair of Thousand Currents group, which handles the administration of the donations made to Black Lives Matter, is a convicted terrorist who was sentenced to 58 years for weapons and explosives charges while a member of the May 19th Communist Organization. She spent 16 years in prison before President Bill Clinton commuted her sentence on his last day. Among other things, Rosenberg was suspected of helping Shakur escape from prison in 1979.

It is notable to mention that Rosenberg was listed as the vice chairwoman of the board of directors for Thousand Currents until the webpage was pulled down after her background was first reported by the Capital Research Center.

For further study:

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The Double Speak of Defund The Police

Black Lives Matter has consistently supported an effort to defund the police; something I have discussed at length on my podcast – “Things I Think About.” (Please do listen and subscribe to it.) The hashtag  #DefundThePolice has a double meaning.

When well-meaning BLM supporters say “defund the police” they really mean “reform the police” so that they are retrained in how they interact with the community and part of their funding is reallocated to community and social programs.  However, several politicians and the greater population receive the phrase as a literal desire to stop funding law enforcement agencies entirely and politicians are acting on that protest by reducing police budgets. The confusion over semantics sparks division and hinders mainstream acceptance. It also does not help things when it is recognized that the Black Lives Matter organization is connected to – Movement for Black Lives (M4BL).

According to The New York Times, The Movement for Black Lives (M4BL) is a coalition of groups across the United States which represent the interests of black communities. It was formed in 2014 as a response to sustained and increasingly visible violence against black communities, with the purpose of creating a united front and establishing a political platform. The collective is made up of more than 150 organizations of which Black Lives Matter is one. On the “Who We Are” section of the M4BL website it reads, “We believe that prisons, police and all other institutions that inflict violence on Black people must be abolished and replaced by institutions that value and affirm the flourishing of Black lives.”

Whether the ultimate aim is dissolution or reform, what is consistent is the violence against police which has yet to be disavowed by BLM on the national level.


NYC protestors chant for dead cops
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For further study:

Why Black Lives Matters not All Lives Matter?

The controversy of saying “all lives matter” in retort to “black lives matter” typically means what Good Housekeeping describes…

At its face, “All Lives Matter” sounds like a we’re-all-in-this-together statement. Some may be using the phrase to suggest that all races should join hands and stand together against racism, which is a sentiment that comes from a good place. But the problem is, the phrase actually takes the focus away from those who need it. Saying “All Lives Matter” redirects the attention from Black lives, who are the ones in peril.

Another popular explanation of this theme is along these lines.

If you break your arm and go to the doctor, and the doctor says “all your bones matter, not just your arm.” You’re gonna look at them stupid because yes, all your bones matter but they are fine, your arm needs attention rn. BLM is that arm, saying all lives matter is redundant.

It is also explained that black lives matter is like a house on fire. Some supporters go as far as to say that if you utter the phrase, “all lives matter” then, you are a racist and beneath contempt because until the BLM movement (and now) you have likely enjoyed a life of white privilege and cannot comprehend the level of oppression that black people suffer daily.

The resistance to saying “all lives matter” is the argument that white people are not (wholly) the problem facing Black America. Rather, it is culture and not color that holds back the black community and not systemic racism. This is not to say that racism does not exist. It is to say that racism should not be a catch-all excuse for not progressing. Indeed, several wounds in the black community are self-inflicted (i.e. black on black crime).  As such, the solution to much of the problems in the black community is self-accountability and not white people. This leads to a constant refrain of if/then statements that hint at self-accountability, such as…

At its core, I think, the arguments can be summed up like this:

  • People who say “black lives matter” are saying, “I am oppressed. Stop oppressing me (with your privilege and systems), racist.”
  • People who reply with “all lives matter” are saying, “I am not oppressing you. Stop calling me racist.”
  • Both sides are saying to the other, “No, stop, you don’t understand.”

Regardless of the side you identify with, saying “all lives matter” can cost you a job, verbal abuse, violence, mob violence and even death. Case in point…

Doty Whitaker Family Asks for Help, Pastor Starts "All Lives Matter" Group

This is not an exhaustive list of arguments against the Black Lives Matter movement. They are merely the ones that caught my eyes the most as I was researching. Additional arguments can be found online and I would encourage everyone to do their own research on the matter. What I think you will find is that most of the arguments overlap but essentially comes down to the following: BLM wants to disrupt traditional family structure and exclude fathers from vision of community, BLM is anti–Christian, openly promoted segregation, are accused constantly of being supported by racists within their own ranks and most of all, hate black people who don’t support their agenda.

And finally, an argument against supporting BLM that I am hearing more of is an open and increasingly vocal desire to destroy the country and rebuild it from the ground up. This is in line with the Marxist ideology of reconstructing society. As an example of this, see the video below.

And this concludes my sharing on BLM. If you have come this far and are offended, please review my personal disclaimer at the beginning of my article. If you are not offended but are awakened to new information, I implore you to research further. I am in a phase of my life where I am highly skeptical of the mainstream news. I suggest that you be as well.

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