In two different parts of the country two precious little boys’ lives were snuffed out. And while there will be some coverage of their stories, media won’t stay there long. You see, the media can’t care about a black boy killed by black gang members and they can’t care about a white boy killed by black police officers. It’s just not their thing.
His name was Tyshawn Lee. He was nine years old, he loved basketball and could be regularly found with his ball headed to shoot hoops. In fact, on November 2nd he was headed to the park just down the street from his grandmother’s house when he was lured into an alley and shot seven times in his face and back. Little Tyshawn was the target of his father’s rival gang and on Chicago’s South Side at approximately 4pm, in broad daylight he was executed. Tyshawn Lee was laid to rest Tuesday, November 10th.
Jeremy Mardis loved school. His favorite activities in his first-grade class were visiting the dress-up centers and pretend play. Six-year old Jeremy Mardis was non-verbal autistic. On November 3rd in Marksville, Louisiana he was shot five times in his head and chest when police officers fired 18 rounds into the SUV he was traveling in with his father. He was still buckled in the front seat next to his dad when he died. Jeremy’s family buried him Monday, November 9.
Of course there’s some coverage of these tragic incidents. I wouldn’t be able to comment on them otherwise. But I want more. I want CNN to book blocks of hotels in Baton Rouge and travel to Marksville every day until they exhaust every angle of this story. I want reporters on the ground talking to anyone and everyone who can tell us why these black officers would shoot and kill this white, autistic child. I want athletes to take to the field with their hands up (the positon of Jeremy’s dad when officers Greenhouse and Stafford murdered his son). I want high profile Hollywood directors to talk about the murder of innocent white people by those charged to protect them.
In Chicago I want protestors linking arms and marching through the Auburn-Gresham neighborhood. I want people to put black tape around their arms and lie down in the alley where Tyshawn was murdered. I want chants. I want seven seconds of silence- one second for each shot fired into the body of that nine-year old boy. I want black ministers onsite doing interviews declaring they want justice or else. I want traffic slowed because residents refuse to go home until the responsible gang gives us the trigger man. I want all the stuff we’ve grown used to seeing when media hype is involved. I want Americans to be told to think about Tyshawn Lee and Jeremy Mardis even though they don’t fit the narrative.
I’m not going to hold my breath. Tyshawn and Jeremy are not the stories driving liberal media sentiment these days. No, in order for us to hear about them every day Tyshawn would need to have been murdered by a white man. Black Lives Matter would have to set up camp, and Don Lemon would need to hold a town hall. As for Jeremy Mardis, he needed to be black and the officers needed to be white.
We’re in trouble in this country. The liberal media drives our discussions. They can’t tell us what to think but they can and do tell us what to think about. They are the ones who give value to people’s lives and sadly they take it away. They cause tensions in our workplaces and when they’re done we’re left to calm them. If our president had a son, I wonder if he would look like Tyshawn. The mayor of Marksville basically admitted there is corruption in his town. I wonder if Loretta Lynch in Eric Holder fashion will launch an investigation to insure there is real #justiceforjeremy. Again, I won’t hold my breath.
If we, the American people, don’t wake up it will be too late to turn this ship. We will find ourselves angry at each other because it sells. We’ll destroy our nation with our own tweets and Facebook posts. We the people if we’re not careful will give power to the mob. And when we’re completely destroyed and powerless to think independently we’ll remember a time when there was law, order, and actual journalism.
