OPINION: Living and Dying in America

By Kaya Miller

We live in the United States of America. Americans being shot by our own fellow citizens is nothing new, unfortunately. Since before our nation could even be counted as an independent country, Americans have been proud gun toters. And most recently, as of last year, there seems to have been a sudden spike in shootings, mass or otherwise—and police brutality. The beginning months of 2021 have been especially brutal, with mass shootings on April 15th in Indianapolis, April 8th in Texas, March 22 in Colorado, March 16th in Atlanta, February 19th in Minnesota, and January 9th in Illinois.

But those are just the mass shootings—a sentence I did not think I ever would utter; “just the mass shootings.” What a strange way to word such a thing. There was also a bombing during Christmas in Nashville, and who could ever forget this year’s post-election day of infamy, with deaths resulting from the January 6th pro-Trump insurrection. Not to mention the countless numbers of people being killed by police and civilians in smaller incidents, like most recently the young Ma’Khia Bryant, shot dead outside her foster home at age 16, and of course the rise in life-threatening hate crimes Asian Americans have faced during the pandemic.

Our nation has always been troubled by physical violence, this is not something we can deny. Lethal attacks happen all the time. But with not much else to do in the world but look around and observe, you notice more and more via the news, social media, or in person, and through your’s and others first-hand experiences, the violence rising in America. It all came crashing down on me when I was on the phone with family after hearing about the Fed-Ex shooting in Indianapolis this past week and a half. I looked up shootings by race, as I was curious, and as you could expect I was met with a list of mass shootings, and a graph showcasing that those committing these heinous crimes were predominantly white men. Looking into it further, to fully make sure that what I was seeing was true, I looked up “recent” shootings, just to see more detailed accounts. As I compiled and compared reports on recent shootings, it served to remind me of just how close together these occurrences happened.

It felt like less than a week since hearing about the shooting in Atlanta of 8 women, 6 of which were Asian. I remember that as soon as I heard about that tragedy I immediately did what I could to help spread awareness. I posted the graphs, I shared the news bulletins, I put the informational links in my bios. But then, not even a full week later, I saw headlines about yet another shooting. So I share, I discuss and I spread awareness. Then the media shocks us again with Daunte Wright’s “accidental” shooting on April 11th, flooding our televisions with fragments of facts, releasing partial camera footage, without even fully showing what was happening—or giving us “the full picture” as we say. Do I care about these deaths and the actual severity of what is happening? Absolutely, that is why I rage to my family about it, post the stories, and look into them however I can, whenever I can. Do I think this phenomenon is also trendy? I fear it is becoming so.

I don’t write this only to list just how many incidents have gone by, but to open up about my fears and opinions. I am worried that there is misinformation infiltrating our concern and righteous anger. Specifically with Daunte Wright, I had not known fully what was going on when I liked and shared certain posts I passed along. It was first said he was shot due to an air freshener, which brought people to his defense as immediate posts about the freshener were shared. This however was not the case; Daunte did have a warrant out for his arrest, and that was why, after being pulled over for a traffic violation, it was discovered that Wright’s tags were not registered. As they ran him through the system he was found to have a warrant out for his arrest. He then struggled and resisted against the arrest, understandably so, and gets into his car to drive off. He makes it only so far because he was shot, by a gun when the officer who fired claims she had wanted to use a taser instead. It is also said that she was a training officer, patrolling her beat with a new trainee by her side, making her fatal mistake with her weapon even more unacceptable.

As a civilian it is hard to understand how she could mistake a gun for a taser, and becomes even more difficult to believe after reading a statement from Police Chief Gannon, “For informational purposes we train with our handguns on our dominant side, and our taser on our weak side … If you’re right-handed you carry your firearm on your right side and carry your taser on the left. This is done purposefully, and it’s trained.” With all this in mind, the conclusion is still the same. The young man should not be dead, and his “accidental” murder should definitely still be talked about as a problematic police killing, whether it was racially motivated or not.

I shared this specific story as an example of the misinformation available, and how when we post or re-post things, we may forget to research and double-check our facts. It is important to have the right information in these situations as anti-Black Lives Matter and pro-police people can use our phrasing and posts as ammunition, claiming that when we criticize abuses of power by law enforcement officers, we do not provide the full context. It is also worrisome that both media and public reaction to these events is so quick and routine, almost as if we are desensitized towards all that is going on. With so much happening all at once, facts can become blurred or even oversimplified for quick news and shares. I believe it is imperative to check all facts, especially if we want to be taken seriously as a movement, or simply as people begging for positive change.

Similarly, a lot of different takes and stories are coming out about teenaged Ma’Khia Bryant, who was shot 4 times during an altercation with both the police and some girls she was allegedly threatening with a knife. There have been different takes on whether or not she called the police, or what she was doing with the knife, but not all of it matters. To put it simply, she should not be dead, regardless of what she was doing. Some say her actions were self-defense since she called the police about her being assaulted outside her foster home by the girls she is seen pinning against the car. Others argue the opposite by saying she was threatening the two girls, and running towards the policeman madly. Even my own family brought up Ma’Khia’s mother’s troubled past, and her loss of parental rights over her daughter.

I believe, and hopefully you agree, that in the big picture, whatever her family situation was, whoever called the police, and who was attacking whom, these details do not fully matter. Of course in Wright’s case, his past is important because it explains how the attempted arrest began. But with Ma’Khia Bryant, the evidence of excessive force is all right there. I watched the body cam footage, and immediately was outraged. She was shot, by my count 4 times. Four bullets as she lay sprawled on her back, the cop firing four times as she had already fallen to the ground. Of course what happened leading up to those fatal moments—with her moving up close to the policeman and her seeming to attack another person—are all important to understand the altercation, but I still find it important to stress that she should not have been shot so many times, or mortally wounded.

Hinting at desensitization once more, we seem to have gotten ourselves into a strange groove: looking at the news, creating posts, sharing links, posting the victim’s photos, and then having people blindsided by their beliefs going against it all. We watch the video footage, get outraged, protest and watch our objections mostly come to no fruition, instigate no change, just a President sharing condolences, a police officer being investigated, and another family grieving in the public eye while we all scramble to share and understand the truth.

In summary, I am sick of it. I am tired of seeing a new death, a new trial, a new crime, a new outrage each and every month. I am repulsed by the stagnant position we seem to occupy, as a legal “win” occurs followed by yet another shocking loss perhaps hours later. Disappointed that 10 miles away from a major police brutality trial, another black man can be routinely shot, killed, and mourned. We as a nation are dying, our spirits are drowning in all the depressing news, and you could always say “don’t look, just ignore,” but that gets us nowhere. I love and appreciate all that the internet does for us, allowing me to share this news and receive others, but I loathe just how quickly we can jump from crisis to crisis, sometimes—most times—never fully helping the last one to resolve or heal itself. I write this today to ask you to be more aware, to see that we are in a dangerous loop, and to help me try to break it.

What can we do aside from stick together and push, hoping that the adults see our fear and passion and channel it to finally make an impact? We want a lasting victory over sociopolitical systems designed to terrorize black people, not one whose temporary triumph can be diminished within the same night. To close, remember that we have voices, and as little as they may be, they can join together to reach heights we never could have dreamed of. Remember that a murderer being found guiltly of murder is not the true justice, but that making societal changes to prevent more murders could be. Finally, remember that we can do better as a nation. We have to do better, and stay collectively vigilant in our long, steep climb towards true social equality for all.

I encourage you to read and search through the following topics, to better educate yourself and those around you. I hope this article gave you something to agree with, or at least think about, and hopefully also some clarity around the distressing truths of our nation.

Sites to Read and What You Can Look Up: