The nation’s largest gathering of LGBT people and advocates – the San Francisco Pride parade – announced several of its “grand marshals” for the 2016 event, including Black Lives Matter as “Organizational Grand Marshall.”
“An international network of more than 30 chapters working for the validity of Black life, Black Lives Matter is working to (re)build the Black liberation movement and affirm the lives of all Black people, specifically Black women, queer and trans people, people who are differently abled, and those who are undocumented and formally incarcerated,” according to the San Francisco Pride website.
“Centering on those who are marginalized within Black liberation movements, Black Lives Matter imposes a call to action and response to state-sanctioned violence against Black people, as well as the virulent anti-Black racism that permeates our society.”
The announcement comes amid heightened tensions between the Black Lives Matter movement and San Francisco Police charged with keeping the Pride celebrations safe.
Last month, the San Francisco Examiner pointed out that a Wall Street Journal op-ed titled “The Myths of Black Lives Matter” hung for several days on a bulletin board inside the Taraval police station with several pertinent sections highlighted.
The article, authored by Health Mac Donald, was posted to the same bulletin board officers go to for their daily assignments, and pointed out several unchallenged falsehoods about the Black Lives Matter movement.
“But what if the Black Lives Matter movement is based on Fiction?” the article read. “Not just the fictional account of the 2014 police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., but the utter misrepresentation of police shootings generally … You would think killer cops pose the biggest threat to young black men today. But this perception, like almost everything else that many people think they know about fatal police shootings, is wrong.”
Mac Donald pointed out in the op-ed that more whites and Hispanics die in police shootings than blacks, who are much more likely to be shot by another black person, the San Francisco Examiner reports.
The Wall Street Journal article increased heightened tensions between police and the city’s black community that came to a head in December, when a judge affirmed a one-year statute of limitations on police misconduct investigations prohibits the city from punishing about 10 officers who sent racist and homophobic text messages in 2012.
A “massive breakdown” in the police department essentially meant the officers could not be punished for the allegedly racist remarks, San Francisco District Attorney George Gascon said in a statement last year.
“What’s worse, some were allowed to continue in civilian contact positions despite knowledge of the text messages, thereby putting thousands of cases in jeopardy,” Gascon said, according to the Examiner. “The fact that San Francisco is forced to retain police officers that demonstrated explicit racism will have ramifications for the reputation of the department, the fair administration of justice, and the trust of the community SFPD serves.”
In January, Black Lives Matter activists shut down the westbound lanes of the San Francisco’s Bay Bridge by chaining their vehicles and themselves to the structure.
The bridge shutdown followed four days of Black Lives Matter protests focused on the fatal police shooting of Mario Woods, a black 26-year-old with a knife who allegedly matched the description of a suspect in stabbing case, The Guardian reports.
The bridge protest resulted in 24 arrests.
Black Lives Matter activists have also picketed the homes of the city’s mayor and police chief, protested at Oakland and San Francisco airports, shouted the mayor off the state at a Martin Luther King Day breakfast, and picketed a local fast food restaurant over a black worker who was fired in recent months, according to the news site.
Leave a Comment
COMMENTS POLICY: We have no tolerance for messages of violence, racism, vulgarity, obscenity or other such discourteous behavior. Thank you for contributing to a respectful and useful online dialogue.