This weekend marked the one-year anniversary of the death of Michael Brown, an unarmed black teenager shot and killed by a white police officer in Ferguson, Missouri.
And after 365 days, Larry Wilmore wanted to see on Tuesday’s “The Nightly Show” if anything changed.
There was some progress, Wilmore was happy to report. Ferguson police praised the work of community members in the last year and noted that Sunday night’s shootings were not from protesters.
“Normally, when you think about it, shootings and protests are conflated as one and the same. Kinda like how two charming, charismatic, debonair black screen stars can be confused for one another. Like Idris Elba and this guy,” Wilmore said, showing a picture of him and Elba.
But, overall, Ferguson one year later isn’t much different from last year, “The Nightly Show” found.
“I can’t think anymore. I got Ferguson fatigue, man. I thought this shit would be over. Think my brain has room to keep come up with racial injustice metaphors for your stupid show? It’s exhausting, brother,” contributor Mike Yard said.
Watch the clip, from Comedy Central, below:
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That’s the nature of the media, though. Beat something into the ground.
I’m still waiting for Mr. Wilmore to address the protests against Senator Sanders, though.
The protests are working. Sanders has put up new policy measures on his website and has hired an african american woman on his staff. I have been watching a lovely woman named Alizia Garza who is the founder of BLM. She is a bright elegant woman who has been explaining their reasons on many programs on MSNBC. Black americans have had it up to their ears and want to be heard instead of taken for granted. She said in response to Ari Melber the other night when he asked her if they were concerned this might be causing problems and she said “Power concedes nothing without demand”.
Also, he asked her if they had plans to disrupt the republicans and she said they plan to disrupt every candidate. If you recall Trump made fun of the fact that the group took the microphone from Bernie as if to say they would never do that to him but I am sure they have plans for him also.
And, if they had asked Senator Sanders nicely, he would have done the same thing, and knowing Senator Sanders, the addition of the policy measures was something forthcoming anyway.
No, I get that this is about grabbing headlines, but so far, they haven’t seemed to try to disrupt any Republicans. A column on The Daily Beast noted that protests accomplish very little. In fact, part of why the Civil Rights Movement accomplished very little in the 1950’s is a lack of access to the corridors of power. However, between the protests and the lobbying (lots and lots of lobbying) and the access that having a Presidential ally meant, legal measures ending discrimination were passed.
It was heavily noted that, after the last protest disrupting Senator Sanders, a lot of people were furious and the mood among those who came to hear Senator Sanders speak was vicious and in some cases on social media very hateful. That’s the problem. Protests disrupting those who are allies and who would be willing to amp up the message if asked politely can result in a loss of potential allies among that person’s audience.
We’ll apparently it’s going to continue and if you read my response above, the head of the organization has said they will be disrupting all the candidates. It is more difficult to get close to Hilllary because her rallies are pretty closed to the public and by invite only and she has secret service around her at all times.
I think this is a perfect example of how little we as white people understand how deeply the black community feels about this issue and that the Michael Brown murder was the straw that broke the camel’s back. Latinos have coalesced together to make their voices heard on immigration and black americans are trying to do the same thing.
Chammy…I ran into this with the LGBT Community, and as a trans woman, I understand a lot about it given how many of my sisters out there are being raped and murdered by these very police, and many of them are trans women of color. I’m furious about this issue, but at the same time, I’m also someone who looks at how to do things most effectively. One of the first stories I covered when I worked as a journalist was the murder of a trans woman in Tennessee. The police had been harassing her as a “prostitute” and when she turned up dead, no investigation was ever fully conducted. I covered dozens of those over the years I worked as a journalist…not to mention the case of a police officer who got suspended with pay for the rape of two trans women.
It just upsets me when a good message gets destroyed by people who don’t want to think about things like how awful it looks to disrupt a candidate who has a long history of supporting Civil Rights, and who is Jewish (and them bandying about the ‘white supremacist’ term).
Oddly enough, it isn’t that I don’t understand…It’s that I do. I may not be articulating things very well at times, but I really do understand the anger and frustration. I just also know from first hand experience that most people are not as understanding as Senator Sanders and that these disruptions, especially against someone who is an ally, are upsetting people.