To the editor:

I felt sadness on Martin Luther King Day when I remembered that a man of courage and wisdom was murdered for trying to improve race relations in this country. At least his legacy lived on in the 9,000-plus Black Lives Matter protests which arose across the U.S. after George Floyd’s murder. 

But just as in the ’60s when conservative Republicans demonized Civil Rights protestors and their leaders, they hijacked BLM. Again, repetitive media-looping of rioting was used to profile Blacks as violent people, while the actual issues were ignored or downplayed. The BLM movement’s hope that racial profiling or arrest-related violence could be countered was deflected by the GOP altogether. 

Even as legal measures were being attempted to hold police accountable for unduly harming innocent people, the GOP’s “Back the Blue” counter-campaign simply created further dissension and roadblocks for change. The GOP resisted observations that in situations involving mental illness, domestic disputes or traffic violations, an armed, adversarial-mentality tended to escalate rather than diffuse the dynamics. Suggestions for constructive alternatives were twisted into an accusation that Democrats were trying to “defund the police!”

So I’m saddened that a compassionate dialogue begun by Martin Luther King to bring fellow human beings together is derailed every time the GOP uses its “us vs. them” messaging. And that instead of progress, the Mapping Police Violence Project found that the number of people killed by police in 2022 doubled. Can’t we unite behind decisive improvements, instead of divisive rhetoric?

Martha Hodges

Massena