Black Lives Matter

Black Lives Matter is an activist movement in the United States that began in the wake of the July 2013 acquittal of George Zimmerman in the Florida shooting death of African American teen, Trayvon Martin.

Black Lives Matter claims inspiration from the African American Civil Rights Movement, the Black Power movement, the 1980s Black feminist movement, Pan-Africanism, Anti-Apartheid Movement, Hip hop, LGBTQ social movements, and Occupy Wall Street.

78% of whites say inner-city crime is a bigger problem than police discrimination against minorities, while 56% of blacks say discrimination. And 82% of black voters think black Americans receive unfair treatment from police. Just 30% of whites see it that way.

In a study of Houston, Texas police officers, economist Roland G. Fryer, Jr. discovered that police were 23.8% less likely to shoot at black suspects than white suspects.

Many different people have joined the movement because they also see the treatment black men and women receive in America. This is not a group that wants to discriminate against all other races and make African Americans superior. Instead, they want equal treatment of all races.

Blacks make up 50% of inmates in state and local prisons for drug offenses, even though Blacks comprise 13% of the U.S. population and whites are more likely to use drugs.