Genre Transformation Post 6
My post was a simple attention grabber for my topic. I made a short video that explained my topic and gave anyone who saw it a well understanding of what is at hand. The audience I aimed for was the Gen Z (younger audience) and also maybe the older audience if they end up seeing the video. I posted the short video on my social media platforms (Twitter & Instagram), when posting the video I put a short caption explaining the post and topic that way the people who viewed it understood what they were watching.
https://spark.adobe.com/sp/design/video/urn:aaid:sc:US:143e345c-bc8b-450d-a229-ac660ba97c16
Post Five
Throughout the years, we have gone through many events and changes that have either done good in the world or made us backtrack. For example, racism, it has followed us since the beginning. Many events have helped the black community achieve the rights in America as well as the entire world. By this century, we thought it would’ve been all put behind us and the world would be a better place, but we were wrong. Racism had never left, it may be different than it was before but to this day it is still seen as the main issue in the world. Where the Black community being picked off and hurt by white individuals and not even our own judicial system can help stop these events. Racism follows us everywhere, from our jobs to the local grocery store, no matter where. The topic of racism is just one part, or one layer as you may call it, as to where there are many other layers that make up the entire topic.
In the article, “Black Lives Matter: tackling racism in the workplace” written by Natalie Birchall explains how inequality in the workplace has been hidden for way too long and is now being pointed out at many workplaces. Birchall mentions ““The international outcry following the recent tragic death of George Floyd in the United States has dominated the news and social media in recent months. Here in the UK, thousands of people took part in large demonstrations across the country, with many of them taking a knee in solidarity with anti-racism movements. Many corporations and institutions across the world have confirmed their support for the Black Lives Matter movement and have committed to addressing inequality in their workplace. This is a positive step for race relations across the globe and all employers, big and small, should renew their commitment to tackling all forms of discrimination at work and elsewhere”. This quote shows how one death of a black individual started this whole uprising which is tragic because it shouldn’t take the death of an individual for us to take action. We as a community, matter of fact as a world should stop letting this happen to our peers and loved one’s and help reach a goal as to where this racial violence can be put to an end, which is what we did. The Black Lives Matter movement, also known as the BLM, was founded to help overcome the racial violence and reach the rights that the black community deserve. The judicial system won’t do anything to help, which is why we had to take the matter into our own hands, hence all of the protests that occurred.
For example, the main issue revolving around the topic of racism/violence is police brutality. We all see it as to where it is on the news, social media, even the shows/movies we watch give examples of it as well. Many events of police brutality have taken place over the years have led to more deaths than either incarcerations or even tickets, if you may see the list of how many people died when all they were stopped for were low charges you would think something is wrong. In the article/website, “Know their names” written by Alia Chughati explains and lists all of the lives lost from the hands of our law enforcement and who were not protected by our judicial system. For example, it mentions, “Daniel Prude, a man who was in the middle of a mental breakdown that led him running into the street naked. Police were called to assess the situation. With how Prude’s mentality was he didn’t know what he was doing which led him to be killed.” This website is a credible source that gives us a run through and example of what our law enforcement is capable of. If one name isn’t enough there are others. For example, here are a few for you, George Floyd, Treymar Martin, Breonna Taylor, Rayshard Brooks, etc. Just to show you how childish this is, Mr. Brooks was in a fast food line where he ended up falling asleep and blocked anyone else from leaving, the police were called to simply remove him which ended up in the death of Mr. Brooks. This event, along with all of the other ones show that our law enforcement when they see a person of color, has the shoot first ask questions later mentality which is not the right thing.
Most people would think we are over exaggerating about the topic and may take it out of proportion but those individuals are the ones that do not have to live in fear of having a target on their back and those individuals also do not understand the actual definition of the term “police brutality”. The term, “police brutality” also known as excessive use of force, unwarranted or excessive and often illegal use of force against civilians by U.S. police officers which can legally be defined as a civil rights violation, where law enforcement officers exercise undue or excessive force against a subject. Police brutality has been the poison to our communities which we need to deal with ourselves because no one else will, which is why the Black Lives Matter movement has been organized for this very reason to overcome the problem and seek justice for all of the black lives lost. According to the article, “Fatal Force” written by The Washington Post explains how the excessive force that our law enforcement uses has changed over the years and not in the way we think it would’ve. In 2015, The Washington Post began to log every fatal shooting by an on-duty police officer in the United States. In that time there have been more than 5,000 such shootings recorded by The Post. They mention, “in the last year about almost 1,000 black individuals have been shot and killed by police for light crimes”. This source provides the data and statistics of how our law enforcement “excessive forcing” is working out.
The Black Lives Matter movement also known as the “BLM” movement is an organization made by black individuals who came with one purpose. That purpose being to seek justice for all of the black lives lost from the hands of our judicial system/law enforcement and to receive change that will prevent these violent events to happen again. The event that made this organization happen was the death of Treymar Martin, since that day our eyes opened and needed change. The only way for our voices were going to be heard was to start an organization, to start an entire movement centered by the cause. It wasn’t until late 2019- early 2020 when we needed to take action following the tragic death of George Floyd. Most of you should know the story of George Floyd’s death. Mr. Floyd was being arrested for what seemed to be him using a “counterfeit bill” which led to Floyd being pinned to the ground with an officer’s knee pressed against the neck of Mr.Floyd which led to his death. Since then we have taken action and protested to seek justice for all of the black lives lost and to seek change in our system which is changing slowly.
Police brutality or “excessive force” as I mentioned many times before, is more bad than good and our judicial system will not do anything about it. In the article, “Black Lives Matter Grows as Movement While Facing New Challenges” published by John Eligon explains how the events of police brutality are setting us back and the only way to stop them is to do what we are doing and use our voices to receive change. Eligon mentions, “Black Lives Matter protests — or even the possibility of them — have changed the way that people in power respond. Elected leaders, including Gov. Tony Evers of Wisconsin, now tend to engage instantly and insistently with matters that in the past had been dealt with primarily by the police. Officers are named, details are shared and there are promises of thorough investigations — on Wednesday, by the Justice Department”. This quote caught my eye because when it mentioned elected leaders such as Gov. Tony Evers made me realize that electing leaders who support our cause is another way in receiving change for the better which is what we desperately need.
In conclusion, the Black Lives Matter movement has been one of the best things to come out of all of this hatred. In my opinion, racism is like a poison to our world and to our judgements. Some may think of the movement as some sort of a revolution, in which it sort of is because we are fighting for what is deserved. With the judicial system and the current leader of the United States it does not seem to be as important for them which only means we had to take matters into our own hands and show that we mean business to receive the rights we severely deserve. All of the protests and riots that were done in the past couple of months was a perfect example. Slowly, one step at a time we are receiving what we as a community, as a country, gathered and fought for. For the future, we cannot exactly say what will change and what America will turn out to be but for now all we can do is keep on fighting for what we believe in and as a community we can get it done.
Post Four
As big of a topic being the Black Lives Matter movement, it comes with many aspects and opinions. In the article, “The Price of Civil Rights: Black Lives, White Funding, and Movement Capture” written by Megan Ming Francis explains how civil rights movements just like the Black Lives Matter movement truly operate, the behind the scenes, and how they are supported by other organizations. Francis brings up a wide amount of information about how these organizations work with funding, branding, etc. She mentions, “What influence do funders have on the development of civil rights legal mobilization? Fundraising is critical to the creation, operation, and survival of most rights organizations. Even though, despite the importance of funding, there is a systematic attention in the law and social movements and cause of lawyering literature on the relationship between funders and grantees”. This explains how it takes a while to get a movement such as this one to fully launch, as to where you have to find funding, launch campaigns, and many other things which most of the time you cannot find due to what your organization wishes to help. In this case, with the BLM movement you would think it would not reach funding fast due to what their cause is and how the world is set up with its racial problems.
The Black Lives Matter movement along with other rights organizations deserve to get the proper funding in order to make a change. I never knew exactly what went on and what had to be done in order to start an organization. In this article it argues that the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) a well-funded organization which was developed to help organizations such as the BLM movement had developed second thoughts and was thinking of parting ways. Francis mentions, “I argue that funders engaged in a process of movement capture whereby they used their financial leverage to redirect the NAACP’s agenda away from the issue of racial violence to a focus on education at a critical juncture in the civil rights movement”. In this she explains how the organization and its funders decided to now pull their funding and support for these organizations and forget all of the racial violence that is happening in the world. Before reading this article, I did not realize how all of this worked. I used to think starting a movement/organization like this wouldn’t take as many requirements and steps to achieve. This is important because people need to understand without these key steps, without these organizations we wouldn’t have these movements and platforms for our voices to be heard.
Throughout the years this topic being racial violence and the Black Lives Matter movement have been the spark to most conversations this century. With a topic like this there are many tiers and stories that go into this. The author of the article has pointed out many true aspects within the movement along with many that most people as well as myself did not know. Reading this article will give readers a better idea and more insight to what is really going on behind the movement and how things are not only happening in the streets but as well in the offices.
Work Cited
Francis, Megan Ming. “The Price of Civil Rights: Black Lives, White Funding,
and Movement Capture.” Wiley Online Library, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd, 29 Jan. 2019, onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/lasr.12384.
Post Three: Topic Sources
The Black Lives Matter movement has been seen as many things throughout the past year or so, from a revolution to the opposing side saying it is a waste of time.The goal of the movement being to overthrow the racist judicial system along with seeking justice for all of the black lives we have lost. There are many articles, podcasts, tweets, posts, etc about the movement due to it being one of the most trending/important topics in the world which also means many sources to back up ideas and opinions.
First Source:
Oppel, Richard A., et al. “What We Know About Breonna Taylor’s Case and Death.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 30 May 2020, www.nytimes.com/article/breonna-taylor-police.html.
Richard A. Oppel, a New York Times Editor, in his article “What we know about Breonna Taylors case and death” implies that our judicial system needs severe help to prevent things like this. Oppel supports the movement and its goal to overthrow the judicial system and seek justice for Breonna Taylor and all of the other black lives we have lost to the system. His purpose is to make the readers realize what is going on in this world by keeping tabs on the case and killing of Breonna Taylor. By showing updates in the case, the readers can realize how corrupt our judicial system is.
The article provides tabs and information about the case and killing of “Breonna Taylor”, which helps the world keep tabs and to realize how the tragic event took place.
Second Source:
Tillery, Alvin. “(PDF) What Kind of Movement Is Black Lives Matter? The View from Twitter.” ResearchGate, 2018, www.researchgate.net/publication/323019189_What_Kind_of_Movement_is_Black_Lives_Matter_The_View_from_Twitter.
Alvin Tillery, a professor at Northwestern University, implies how a movement such as the Black Lives Matter movement can use a platform such as Twitter to help reach millions of people in order to reach a big goal that they have. Tillery supports the movement and how they have used social media to change the future of the U.S. and the corrupt judicial system that we have. His purpose was to make readers realize how a big movement as this one uses a platform to let black voices be heard. He uses many examples and stories to help inspire other colored voices to share their life stories.
The article provides information on how the Black Lives Matter movement has changed evryone’s lives by using the one thing they use the most, that being technology along with social media platforms.
Third Source:
Colebrook, Claire. “Fast Violence, Revolutionary Violence: Black Lives Matter and the 2020 Pandemic.” Journal of Bioethical Inquiry, 2020, pp. 1–5., doi:10.1007/s11673–020–10024–9.
Claire Colebrook, an Australian cultural theorist, who currently is appointed Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of English at Pennsylvania State University implies that The 2020 pandemic cannot be taken away from the problem, pace, and spectacle of race, both because of the racial rhetoric regarding the basic of the virus and because of the racial injustice in the distribution of healthcare. Tillery supports her implication by describing how the movement has taken a toll during the pandemic. Her purpose is to make the readers realize how in this year we have seen racism slowly kill us all by releasing these tragic events on the world in order to show the readers exactly what is going on. She establishes a respectful tone while sharing this information to a wide audience.
This article contains information on how racism has spiked even through the pandemic that is in place. This paper adds the concept of fast violence to Rob Nixon’s “slow violence” to look at the intersection between the climate of the planet and the climate of racial injustice.
Fourth Source:
Ghandnoosh, Nazgol, and Sentencing Project , Issuing Body. Black Lives Matter: Eliminating Racial Inequity in the Criminal Justice System. Washington, D.C.: Sentencing Project, 2015. Web.
URL: https://sfstate-primo.hosted.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/f/1ojfr7s/01CALS_ALMA71420057160002901
Nazgol Ghandnoosh, Ph.D., Research Analyst at The Sentencing Project. The report draws on a 2014 publication of The Sentencing Project, Incorporating Racial Equity into Criminal Justice Reform implies how Uneven policing in Ferguson and New York City — A cascade of racial disparities throughout the criminal justice system — Causes of disparities. Ghandnoosh supports his implication by describing how in this time with racism it causes racial disparities in the criminal justice system that is not fair to individuals of color. His purpose is to make readers understand how we can lose black lives to the criminal justice system for many causes due to the color of the individual’s skin. He establishes a respectful and formal tone to his wide racially- mixed followers in the Research Analyst at The Sentencing Project.
The article contains a lot of information and statistics on how the criminal justice system is one of the many things that is the reason for racial violence towards colored individuals.
Fifth Source:
Méndez, Xhercis. “Which Black Lives Matter?” Radical History Review 2016.126 (2016): 96–105. Web.
Xhercis, Mendez, an Associate Professor in Women and Gender Studies and Queer Studies and an affiliated faculty of African American Studies at California State University Fullerton implies that the death of Trayvon Martin sparked a series of responses across the U.S. by explaining that the birth of Grassroots Movements, Black Lives Matter, and state-sponsored initiatives, such as My Brother’s Keeper (MBK). With the growing protests and concerns over the structural inequalities in the world, the MBK initiative has gained significant attention and financial support. Mendez supports her implication by describing how the death of Trayvon Martin is one of the main reasons why individuals along with the BLM movement want their voices to be heard and gain rights for black lives all over the world. Her purpose is to make sure the readers know their rights and how to use their voices in order to get what they desperately need and deserve. She uses a respectful and formal tone to attend her racially-mixed variety of followers along with any other individuals that read her article.
Sixth Source:
Forsgren, La Donna. “Black Folks’s Theatre to Black Lives Matter: The Black Revolution on Campus.” Theatre History Studies 36.1 (2017): 301–09. Web.
La Donna L Forsgren, a Associate Professor in the Department of Film, and Theatre; concurrent faculty in the Gender Studies Program; and affiliate faculty in the Department of Africana Studies implies that black student activists used confrontational tactics to force universities to increase the financial aid opportunities for minority students and establish or broaden better action policies.[…]I let them know that despite the unique challenges that persist for this generation of black activists, Mizzou students continue to serve as a source of inspiration for student activists across the United States.[…]How can black student activists maintain and control political and social relevance within the constantly shifting age of social media?[…]What role will theatre and performance play in the revolution on college campuses? Forsgren supports her implication by describing how throughout time, black students have not received the same amount of education as other students of other races. Her purpose is to show the world along with the black individuals that are students that they deserve to receive the same amount of respect and education as all of the other students and how they have their rights just like the others. She uses a formal tone to the wide variety of black readers all over the world with her goal of inspiring as many black individuals as she can.
Source Credibility (Post Two)
As we may know, with the topic being as powerful as the Black Lives Matter movement, there would be many different articles with many different opinions and or approaches. There has been a huge amount of violence towards the African-American community. People of color have been living in fear of our own protectors, those being our own law enforcement. Almost every violent event towards an African-American has been from a police officer which is terrible because they’re the ones that are supposed to be protecting us not killing us. Many deaths have occurred over the decades and nothing has been dealt with, with a corrupt judicial system, no solution has occurred and most likely will never occur. Which is why the black lives matter movement has been made and has one goal which is to stop these deaths and break down our corrupt system. The article I have chosen is “What kind of movement is the Black Lives Matter? The view from Twitter” written by Alvin Tillery. This source talks about how a movement such as this one can along with others use social media platforms such as Twitter and can gain a great amount of support. I picked this source because it gave me a better understanding and shows a different way of how a movement such as this one that has such a high Gail can do almost anything to get itself out there and known to the world. With it being the 21st-century technology itself has shown them to be powerful, which makes it the best place to catch a huge audience.
Movements just like this one use social media platforms such as Twitter to gain an audience to be able to reach their goal. The source What Kind of Movement is Black Lives Matter? The View from Twitter, written by Alvin Tillery explains how this movement used the social media app Twitter to help itself get out to the world which worked. Tillery explains that, “This paper examines the ways that social movement organizations (SMOs) affiliated with the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement use Twitter through three content analysis studies. The main finding presented in the paper is that the modal tweet generated by the BLM accounts between December 1, 2015 and October 31, 2016, an expression of sadness, outrage, or despair — to the traumas of police brutality and killings of African Americans”. Tillery is showing that with this movement Twitter has helped many people get their emotions out about the topic and it made it popular. The source provides a lot of information that leads to credibility. The author when writing this source introduces each quote and provides credit to the author/article. Just as we use the quote sandwich, the author uses his version of it to build up his writing. I believe that using the quote sandwich or any other type of method when writing with quotes helps provide the writer with knowledge that can better his or her writing. Especially with how many references Mr.Tillery used in his writing to keep up with all of the quotes, making sure each was introduced, paraphrased, and explained correctly. Writing can be seen as building blocks, you build your way up in making a great work of peace but you miss something or order it wrong then it has the chance of falling apart.
(Picture used from WordPress.com)
Following the writing comes the author, Alvin Tillery. Tillery is a professor at Northwestern University. WIth the Black Lives Matter movement, it became the best topic to write about, with their being many sides to this. People need to be informed on what is going on and how a movement like this can be the best opportunity to teach this generation on its past and how we can change it for the better. The source was published on a research website named ResearchGate. This website is easy to access to use and research evidence for reference, ideas, etc. You are able to sign up and download any documents as PDFs to save for later times. In my opinion a website such as this one can be a great asset to help research writing. This helps show it being a credible source. As explained before, the author, Alvin Tillery shows many signs of credibility for his writing. He provides his name, along with the date it was written and published.
In conclusion, the source that I have used to prove my point for the semester has made itself a well-written source with its credibility. Tillery has shown that a credible source can make your writing look ten times better knowing that it has a great source/reference to back it. If I am honest, before this I never looked at my sources this way. I have never made sure my source was credible and I never used a method such as the quote sandwich. These methods have made me become a better writer. Looking for a source is easy but looking for a credible source can be more difficult. If you want to make sure your writing is backed up with factual information you must check over your source and make sure it is a credible source. Credible sources have factual evidence which leads to good writing.
Work Cited
Tillery , Alvin. “(PDF) What Kind of Movement Is Black Lives Matter? The View from Twitter.” ResearchGate, 2018, www.researchgate.net/publication/323019189_What_Kind_of_Movement_is_Black_Lives_Matter_The_View_from_Twitter.
Rough Draft: BLM Movement (Post One)
As we know The Black Lives Matter movement is a sociological and political intervention in a place where black lives are intentionally targeted. Throughout the years the black community has undergone many tragic violence from our judicial system. Out of the many world issues we have gone through the one that has never stopped since its existence is racism. A typical definition for this word would be sending hate towards a certain race because of the color of their skin. We all know it’s more to it than just that. Racism is one of the most hurtful terms to be created as to it being the hateful behavior and attitude towards a certain person, could be due to their skin color, ethnicity, cultural background. The Black Lives Matter Movement also known as BLM movement was started as a type of online campaign, with direct campaigning against racism and violence towards the black community, such as the event that started the movement being the killing of Trayvon Martin. It all initiated to counter the fact that African American lives do not matter to the whites for a long time now. Even though it started up in the African American community, it severely captured international views as later people of all races stepped in to this battle to fight for racial equality. We all view the Black Lives Matter movement as a proficient implement that will keep on running and also help the black community reach racial equality.
(Picture from ADL website)
The movement has caught so much attention all across the world which is the plan. This movement is what the black community needed to show that they mean business and are not going to stop fighting until racial equality is reached. I chose to use the movement as my topic proposal because not only with all of the information it may tell, the movement itself is a well thought of masterpiece in my eyes. With the amount of planning and motivation this took no one could have thought how much publicity the movement received it became the face of the world. In the Article, Black Lives Matter: From Hashtag to Movement, the active publisher explains how the BLM movement started off as just a simple hashtag that people used to show their support to the campaign but which later turned into a full on movement after having to suffer many deaths and losses. This led to the movement planning on changing lives and making political and social changes in the world. The article states, “There is a larger context and history of African American men and boys who were killed at the hands of the police, many of whom, like George Floyd (2020), were unarmed. Since 2014, other high-profile deaths include Tamir Rice (2014), Laquan McDonald (2014), John Crawford (2014) Freddie Gray (2015), etc. As you may see the list is longer than you can imagine which proves the point of creating a platform that is inspiring the entire world. Black women and girls are also targets of police violence, a reality that sparked the “Say Her Name” movement to highlight how this violence often goes unnoticed”. All of the deaths stated were all low risks but in the eyes of the “law” any colored person with a hood is a criminal. Most of the deaths we witness are not even towards full grown adults, most deaths are children which is even worse.
(Picture of Breonna Taylor from NYTimes website)
Leaning towards the present, nothing has changed at all. Recently things took a turn when the tragic death of George Floyd was revealed to the world. Another black man killed when he was no threat to anyone. After that day, things were never the same in Minneapolis. Riots and protests were conducted not to only honor the death of Mr. Floyd but to imprison his killers as to it was clearly murder in not only the communitie’s eyes but the law. Soon after the protests in Minneapolis it spread all across the U.S. and later the whole world took action in the movement which had a goal of receiving justice for every life lost in the hands of the corrupt system. The movement was a good time to bring up every name, every child that was taken away from their loved ones. Even before Floyd’s death there was another tragic death of a Louisville EMT Breonna Taylor. If you don’t know her story, let me tell you. Louisville PD had a raid scheduled for a criminal and apparently had the wrong address. Taylor and her boyfriend Kenneth Taylor were in bed, at the time of the raid Kenneth thought it was someone breaking in so he shot at who he saw and after that the Taylor residence became a shooting range. Breonna was pronounced dead after being shot eight times. She died because of a “miscalculation” the Louisville PD says.
After weeks of protesting for racial equality and justice, change started to come. All four officers who took part in George Floyd’s death were charged and stripped from their badges from the department. In the article, Here’s What You Need to Know About Breonna Taylor’s Death, Richard A. Oppel Jr and Derrick Bryson Taylor explain how not only the death of Breonna Taylor, but others such as George Floyd had made an impact in the movement and how we are able to receive changes. The state, “Some — even aside from the continuing protests.
City officials banned the use of no-knock warrants on June 11. Mayor Fischer announced other changes to ensure “more scrutiny, transparency and accountability,” including the naming of a new police chief; a new requirement that body cameras always be worn during the execution of search warrants; and the establishment of a civilian review board for police disciplinary matters. This shows how with movements and hard work just as in the Black Lives Matter Movement, we can receive change and get justice.
In conclusion, the Black Lives Matter Movement has become the most inspiring movement in history as we are all moving the next step from the past, for example being the Civil Rights Movement. From where the movement started it has reached most goals such as improving laws in our judicial system. To think of changes, we would have thought one of the first things to change is police training. Our Police Departments should take more time in training future officers as to them being our future protectors. In my opinion, the BLM movement is a good thing to look at in such an inspiration, for us to be able to expose the system for the corrupt system it has seen to be. For all of the hate it has received it gained even more aid and respect over time. In the political view it will not be downgraded instead it will thrive. Sooner or later we will reach the point to where we will not need to fight anymore in hope of gaining racial equality.
Work Cited
Oppel, Richard A., and Derrick Bryson Taylor. “Here’s What You Need to Know
About Breonna Taylor’s Death.” The New York Times, The New York Times,
30 May 2020, www.nytimes.com/article/breonna-taylor-police.html.
Editor , ADL. “Black Lives Matter: From Hashtag to Movement.”
Anti-Defamation League, 2 June 2020,
www.adl.org/education/educator-resources/lesson-plans/black-lives-matter-from-hashtag-to-movement.
Buchanan, Larry, et al. “Black Lives Matter May Be the Largest Movement in U.S
. History.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 3 July 2020, www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/07/03/us/george-floyd-protests-crowd-size.html.