#SayHerName Is what the world should be chanting… Another verdict that didn’t shock the nation, just a reminder that the old guard still hasn’t changed.
This isn’t the first and it isn’t the last… #SayTheirNames
Yes #BlackLivesMatter
Breonna Taylor
(Do more than say her name)
Hello and welcome to an unusual podcast here on the B Word
As some of you may know and some of you are learning as I speak, the charges against the officers who killed Breonna Taylor were dismissed.
That means this week’s special edition B Word is Breonna Taylor.
Now before we hop into this one, you know how we do.
Leggo.
[Intro]
This one is hard, y’all. I am not going to lie.
I didn’t know Breonna but let it be known, that I named a
B Word episode in her honor.
For those of you who do not know, Breonna Taylor was shot in her home in Louisville, Kentucky on March 13, 2020.
It is said that the incident was incited as the police department issued and executed a No-Knock Warrant for Breonna’s home. This means that they didn’t need to ring the door bell, knock on the door, or introduce themselves before forcing their way into her home.
A little after midnight, officers barged into Breonna’s home. At which point her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker opened fire on the unknown assailants. This resulted in a few rounds of fire passing back and forth in the home. When the dust settled, Breonna Taylor was unresponsive with 6 bullets having taken residence in her body. Now that may be conjecture as I don’t know where the bullets went, but she was shot 6 times.
Kenneth Walker was unharmed and then arrested on charges of assault even though there were several items entered as evidence to show that Kenneth didn’t shoot the officer. The charges were later dropped.
This all started about 4 years ago. Covid was running a muck and that is the next time that civil unrest started to show its face.
We all remember Trayvon Martin. The kid, who at the end of the day, was killed because he looked suspicious. The kid, whose murderer was found not guilty due to stand your ground laws. The kid whose parents will never have a chance to see him graduate from college, or play in another game, or see who he would become. Now, he is a martyr. He is one of the many faces of a movement that started long before he was born and I hope ends before another child is harmed in senseless violence, simply because….
I stop at the because for the same reasons that we see that there are so many distinctions between people. There are so many people who will say that they love their neighbor but will shoot them dead before that neighbor does anything that they deem “suspicious”
When the violence is supported and approved by leadership, is this a coincidence. Is it a coincidence that we are so polarized as a country that we cannot see things for what they are??
My heart tonight is with the family of Breonna Taylor and Kenneth Walker.
I want to take a moment to just say some of their names:
- Daunte Wright, of Minneapolis, Minnesota
- Andre Hill, of Columbus, OH
- Manuel Ellis, Tacoma Washington
- George Floyd, Minneapolis, Minnesota
- Atatiana Jefferson, Fort Worth, Texas
- Aura Rosser, Ann Arbor, Michigan
- Stephon Clark, Sacramento, California
- Botham Jean, Dallas, Texas
- Philando Castille, Falcon Heights, Minnesota
- Alton Sterling, Baton Rouge, Louisiana
- Freddie Gray, Baltimore, Maryland
- Janisha Fonville, Charlotte, North Carolina
- Eric Garner, Staten Island, New York
- Michelle Cosseux, Phoenix, Arizona
- Akai Gurley, Brooklyn, New York
- Gabriella Nevarez, Sacramento, California
- Tamir Rice, Cleveland, Ohio
- Michael Brown, Ferguson, Missouri
- Tanisha Anderson, Cleveland, Ohio
In 2024
- Clifford Brooks, Washington, DC
- Roshod Graham, Lauderhill, Florida
- Isaac Goodlow III, Carol Stream, Illinois
- Terrell Miller, Macomb, Illinois
- Kadarius Smith, Leland, Mississippi
- Samuel Sterling, Kentwood, Michigan
- Frank Tyson, Canton, Ohio
- Gabriel Cheevers, Waldo Florida
- Lawrence McClendon, Waldo, Florida
- Philemon Moore, Waldo, Florida
- Teleak Roberts, Waldo Florida
- Dennis Bodden, Pineville, North Carolina
- Kilyn Lewis, Aurora, Colorado
- William Rankin, Florence County, South Carolina
- Sonya Massey, Springfield, Illinois
This list is long. It is still growing.
To see these names, to read their ages, to learn a little more about them… It is hard to explain to someone who doesn’t live in the marginalized parts of our society that the real crime that any of them were executed for was being Black.
Because being Black still carries the weight of a thousand ships
by b alexander
With hands and feet bound by shackles
Some are steel but most are made of money
Currencies that should wash away with tides and time
but we find that
Paper money is heavier than iron
Digital money is the lock that tethers us
Not as a connection but as an anchor
Our pride keeps us standing on our feet
But our prejudices are the poisons
Eroding, eating away at our society
Gnawing at every piece of us that makes us human
When no one is their brothers keeper
Every one loses, everyone weeps
I don’t know what we need, but we need to see change
Not coins that help to bolster the profits and suspend the economy
Creating a further divide between the .05% and the 99.9%
Coins that can’t cover food or rent
The bare necessities aren’t very basic
When the food is so processed you don’t remember what real food used to taste like
We judge so quickly, that we too treat the symptoms but not the cause
The plague of the pandemic was more a test
Than a call to arms
Opportunity of the politicized, polarized, and profitable
Cause being any thing other, is a sign for disrespect
Thank you all for tuning in to tonights episode of B Word.
I am your host, B Alexander
This week’s B Word, on this special edition podcast is Breonna Taylor.
This one hurts, again. If you find that you would like to further discuss this or any topic, you are welcome to connect with me on social media at iam_balexander
Or you can check me out on my website at www.iambalexander.com
Although this isn’t the news to get your weekend started on a light foot, I hope that it does give you some time to reflect before having to step back into the office on Monday.
Have a very Black-empowered weekend.
PEACE
