From slavery to the Civil Rights Act, blacks have been considered inferior people. Skin color once divided our country, but now one of our own has finally made it to the top.
In four days, our country will never be the same.
The United States of America will welcome its first black president, Barack Obama.
Many blacks who fought and marched for civil rights thought they would never live to see this day. Their efforts were not futile.
Sadly, some blacks have already declared him as “their” president, as if blacks are his number one priority.
Some ignorant people have gone as far as saying they’re expecting Obama to grant black people reparations.
We must grasp the reality that he will be president for this entire country, not just blacks.
And though I don’t agree with these individuals, I understand their desire to champion him for just blacks.
I am not expecting Obama to give out “hook-ups” within the black race.
But I do believe and expect that CHANGE will come.
Hopefully blacks will no longer endure obvious discrimination in the courtrooms. For instance, Americans should never experience cases like Martin Lee Anderson’s where six employees of a Florida juvenile detention center helped to take the life of a black teenage boy.
The incident was captured on tape and yet that evidence still wasn’t enough to persecute the employees.
A similar incident occurred in New York when Sean Bell was murdered by NYPD in 2006.
The police officers assumed Bell was armed and 50 shots were fired at his vehicle.
Not only did they take the life of an innocent unarmed man, but the defendants were acquitted of all charges.
Reading and watching these stories made me feel like we were in the ’60s.
I read stories like this in history books; I never thought I’d witness them in the 21st century.
Unfortunately the list of black people seeking justice goes on.
President-elect Obama should make sure that these cases never happen again. He can’t monitor every courtroom in the country – and he shouldn’t. But with so many publicized discrimination cases against blacks, Obama should want to deliver change.
We don’t want a handout just because we check the same racial box, we just want what is long over due: justice.