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Introduction
Black Lives Matter (BLM) is a decentralized political and social movement that seeks to highlight racism, discrimination, and racial inequality experienced by black people and to promote anti-racism. Its primary concerns are police brutality and racially motivated violence against black people. The movement began in response to the killings of Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, Eric Garner, and Rekia Boyd, among others. BLM and its related organizations typically advocate for various policy changes related to black liberation and criminal justice reform. While there are specific organizations that label themselves "Black Lives Matter", such as the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation, the overall movement is a decentralized network with no formal hierarchy. As of 2021[update], there are about 40 chapters in the United States and Canada. The slogan "Black Lives Matter" itself has not been trademarked by any group.
In 2013, activists and friends Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi originated the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter on social media following the acquittal of George Zimmerman in the shooting death of African-American teen Trayvon Martin. Black Lives Matter became nationally recognized for street demonstrations following the 2014 deaths of two more African Americans, Michael Brown—resulting in protests and unrest in Ferguson, Missouri—and Eric Garner in New York City. Since the Ferguson protests, participants in the movement have demonstrated against the deaths of numerous other African Americans by police actions or while in police custody. In the summer of 2015, Black Lives Matter activists became involved in the 2016 United States presidential election.
The movement gained international attention during global protests in 2020 following the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin. An estimated 15 to 26 million people participated in Black Lives Matter protests in the United States, making it one of the largest protest movements in the country's history. Despite being characterized by opponents as violent, the overwhelming majority of BLM demonstrations have been peaceful.
The popularity of Black Lives Matter has shifted over time, largely due to changing perceptions among white Americans. In 2020, 67% of adults in the United States expressed support for the movement, declining to 51% of U.S. adults in 2023. Support among people of color has, however, held strong, with 81% of African Americans, 61% of Hispanics and 63% of Asian Americans expressing support for Black Lives Matter as of 2023. (Full article...)
Selected general articles
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Image 1
BlackInChem is an organization which aims to highlight and increase the visibility of black chemists. The organization was created as a response to Black Birders Week. The inaugural event ran from August 10 - 15, 2020. (Full article...)BlackInChem BlackInChem
Part of George Floyd protests, Black Lives MatterDate August 10, 2020 Location WorldwideMethods Direct action -
Image 2On July 8, 2015, Jonathan Sanders, a 39-year-old Black man, died while being restrained by Stonewall, Mississippi police officer Kevin Herrington. In January 2016, a grand jury declined to indict the officer, and in March 2016, a grand jury determined Sanders choked after swallowing a bag of cocaine, and police had not used excessive force while restraining him. (Full article...)
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Image 3Jen Reid (born 2 November 1970) is a British Black Lives Matter activist from Bristol. After the statue of Edward Colston was pushed into Bristol Harbour, Reid stood on the empty plinth and made a Black Power salute. This pose was then recreated in the sculpture A Surge of Power (Jen Reid) 2020. (Full article...)
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Image 4American Son is an American drama film directed by Kenny Leon and written by Christopher Demos-Brown, based on his Broadway play of the same name. The film stars Kerry Washington, Steven Pasquale, Jeremy Jordan and Eugene Lee. It premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 12, 2019, and was released on Netflix on November 1, 2019.
The film received a Primetime Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Television Movie. (Full article...) -
Image 5Dear Martin, published in 2018 by Crown Publishing Group, is an adult novel by Nic Stone. It is Stone's debut novel, written as a reaction to the murder of Jordan Davis. The book appeared as #4 on The New York Times Best Seller list. (Full article...)
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Image 6On April 21, 2021, Andrew Brown Jr., a 42-year-old black American, was killed by a gunshot to the back of the head by the Sheriff Department in Elizabeth City, North Carolina, United States. The shooting occurred while deputies were serving drug-related search and arrest warrants at the Brown residence. The arrest warrant, issued on April 20, was for possession with intent to sell "approximately three grams of cocaine." Seven officers were placed on leave as a result of the shooting.
The total amount of footage of the incident is around 2 hours. After being allowed to watch 20 seconds of body camera footage, a Brown family lawyer said that shots were first heard while Brown's car was sitting stationary, in his driveway, and that both of his hands were on the steering wheel. The District Attorney disagreed, saying shots were heard only after Brown put the vehicle in motion, attempted to flee, and caused the car to "make contact" with the arresting officers (none of the deputies sustained injuries). After being allowed to watch around 18 minutes of footage, a second Brown family lawyer said that the videos did not show Brown initiating contact between his car and the deputies. The full body camera videos of the shooting are currently being blocked by a judge's order from being publicly released. (Full article...) -
Image 7On April 11, 2021, Daunte Wright, a 20-year-old black American man, was fatally shot in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota, by police officer Kimberly Potter during a traffic stop and attempted arrest for an outstanding warrant. After a brief struggle with officers, Potter shot Wright in the chest once at close range. Wright then drove off a short distance until his vehicle collided with another and hit a concrete barrier. An officer administered CPR to Wright; paramedics were unable to revive him, and he was pronounced dead at the scene. Potter said she meant to use her service Taser, shouting "Taser! Taser! Taser!" just before firing her service pistol instead.
The shooting sparked protests in Brooklyn Center and renewed ongoing demonstrations against police shootings in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul metropolitan area, leading to citywide and regional curfews. Demonstrations took place over several days, and spread to cities across the United States. Two days after the incident, Potter and Brooklyn Center police chief Tim Gannon resigned from their positions. (Full article...) -
Image 8Corey Jones (February 3, 1984 – October 18, 2015) was shot to death by police officer Nouman K. Raja, while waiting for a tow truck by his disabled car, in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida.
Raja, who was in plainclothes and in an unmarked white van, approached Jones, who was waiting by his disabled vehicle on a highway exit ramp. Within seconds, Raja fired six shots at Jones, striking him three times. After the shooting, Raja falsely claimed to investigators that he had identified himself as a police officer and shot Jones in self-defense; both assertions were disproved by an audio recording of the fatal shooting. (Full article...) -
Image 9The talk is a colloquial expression for a conversation black parents in the United States feel compelled to have with their children and teenagers about the dangers they face due to racism or unjust treatment from authority figures, law enforcement or other parties, and how to de-escalate them. The practice dates back generations and is often viewed as a rite of passage for black children. (Full article...)
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Image 10On August 7, 2020, Julian Edward Roosevelt Lewis, an unarmed 60-year-old American carpenter, was fatally shot by Georgia State Patrol officer Jacob Gordon Thompson, on a rural road in Screven County, Georgia. Thompson attempted to stop Lewis for driving a vehicle with a broken tail light. When Lewis failed to stop, Thompson performed a PIT maneuver to force Lewis's car into a ditch and shot Lewis once in the face. On August 14, Thompson was charged with felony murder. (Full article...)
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Image 11
George Floyd Square, officially George Perry Floyd Square, is a memorialized streetway in Minneapolis for the section of Chicago Avenue that intersects East 38th Street. It is named after George Floyd, a black man who was murdered there by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin on May 25, 2020. The commemorative street name is signed along Chicago Avenue between East 37th Street to East 39th Street and includes the 38th and Chicago intersection.
Public outrage over Floyd's murder resulted in the largest mass protest movement since the civil rights movement, largely over issues of systemic racism and police brutality. In the following weeks, racial justice activists and some community members erected barricades to keep 38th and Chicago street intersection closed to vehicular traffic for over a year during 2020 and 2021. Artists and demonstrators installed several exhibits, paintings, sculptures, and other works of art to memorialize Floyd and visualize racial justice themes. (Full article...) -
Image 12Sasha Johnson (born c. 1993–1994) is a British woman who has been an activist and member of Taking the Initiative Party (TTIP). A student of Ruskin College, she was involved in the Rhodes Must Fall protest, and with Black Lives Matter and Kill the Bill protests.
On 23 May 2021, Johnson was shot in the head. Two days later, five men were arrested on suspicion of attempted murder, one of whom was later charged with conspiracy to murder while the others were released on bail. A second man was charged on 12 June and two further men were charged on 17 June with conspiracy to murder. The four men were scheduled to stand trial in March 2022 but the trial was abandoned in February 2022; the defendants were formally found not guilty when the prosecution offered no evidence. (Full article...) -
Image 13
In May 2020, a young transgender woman of color named Nina Pop was stabbed to death in her own Missouri apartment.
The Human Rights Campaign stated that her death is at least the 10th violent death of an American transgender person or gender non-conforming person in 2020. (Full article...) -
Image 14Patrick Harmon was a 50-year-old African-American man fatally shot from behind by police officer Clinton Fox in Salt Lake City, Utah, on August 13, 2017. The shooting took place after Harmon was pulled over by an officer for riding a bicycle without proper lighting. The incident led to protests in Salt Lake City, some organized by Black Lives Matter. (Full article...)
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Image 15In the United States, use of deadly force by police has been a high-profile and contentious issue. In 2022, 1,096 people were killed by police shootings according to The Washington Post, while according to the "Mapping Police Violence" (MPV) project, 1,176 people were killed by police in total. MPV documented 1,213 killings by police for 2023.
A lack of reliable data has made conclusions about race and policing difficult. Several non-government and crowdsourcing projects have been started to address this lack of reliable data. Research has provided mixed results on the extent of racial bias in the police use of deadly force, with some studies finding no racial bias, while other studies conclude there is racial bias in the use of deadly force. (Full article...) -
Image 16
"Defund the police", a phrase popularized by Black Lives Matter during the George Floyd protests
In the United States, "defund the police" is a slogan that supports removing funds from police departments and reallocating them to non-policing forms of public safety and community support, such as social services, youth services, housing, education, healthcare and other community resources. Activists who use the phrase may do so with varying intentions; some seek modest reductions, while others argue for full divestment as a step toward the abolition of contemporary police services. Activists who support the defunding of police departments often argue that investing in community programs could provide a better crime deterrent for communities; funds would go toward addressing social issues, like poverty, homelessness, and mental disorders. Police abolitionists call for replacing existing police forces with other systems of public safety, like housing, employment, community health, education, and other programs.
The "defund the police" slogan became common during the George Floyd protests starting in May 2020. According to Jenna Wortham and Matthew Yglesias, the slogan was popularized by the Black Visions Collective shortly after the murder of George Floyd. (Full article...) -
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On May 27, 2020, after 11 a.m., a 38-year-old African-American transgender man, Tony McDade, was fatally shot in the Leon Arms apartment complex by an officer of the Tallahassee Police Department, following the fatal stabbing of Malik Jackson on nearby Saxon Street. Early reports of the incident misgendered McDade as a "woman", and on May 28, the police department described McDade as a woman who "identified as a man". On September 3, a Leon County grand jury found that the police use of force against McDade was justified. Police body camera showing McDade pointing a firearm at one of the police officers before being shot was also released.
McDade was a suspect in Jackson's fatal stabbing and police stated that McDade pointed a gun at police and that a bloody knife was found at the scene. Some witnesses have contradicted statements by the Police Department that McDade was armed with a gun. It was also alleged that the officer had called McDade a racial slur before shooting and killing him, though this was later proven false through body camera footage. (Full article...) -
Image 18
On the night of June 12, 2020, Rayshard Brooks, a 27-year-old African American man, was confronted by officers of the APD and was shot by Atlanta Police Department (APD) officer Garrett Rolfe.
APD officer Devin Brosnan was responding to a complaint that Brooks was asleep in a car in a Wendy's restaurant drive-through lane. Rolfe arrived minutes later and conducted a weapons search pat-down, a field sobriety test, and breathalyzer test of Brooks. While talking with officers, Brooks offered several times to walk home. After the breathalyzer, Rolfe stated Brooks was too drunk to drive and attempted to arrest him. (Full article...) -
Image 19"Riot" is a song by American rapper and singer XXXTentacion. It was originally released on SoundCloud in May 2015, before being re-released posthumously for streaming services on June 1, 2020, amid the George Floyd protests. The re-released version is slightly shorter than the original, cutting a large portion of a speech from former Ku Klux Klan leader Jeff Berry, which was used to point out the rising danger of racism, homophobia, and antisemitism in the United States. (Full article...)
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Image 20
On the night of September 6, 2018, 26-year-old accountant Botham Jean was murdered in Dallas, Texas, by off-duty Dallas Police Department patrol officer Amber Guyger, who entered Jean's apartment and fatally shot him. Guyger, who said that she had entered Jean's apartment believing it was her own and believed Jean to be a burglar, was initially charged with manslaughter. The absence of a murder charge led to protests and accusations of racial bias because Jean—an unarmed black man—was killed in his own home by a white off-duty officer who had apparently disregarded police protocols. On November 30, 2018, Guyger was indicted on a charge of murder. On October 1, 2019, she was found guilty of murder and was sentenced to ten years' imprisonment the following day. The ruling was upheld on appeal in 2021. (Full article...) -
Image 21Seven Last Words of the Unarmed is a choral composition by Atlanta-based composer Joel Thompson.
The piece contains seven movements, each of which quotes the last words of an unarmed Black man before he was killed. Thompson has said that in composing the piece, he "used the liturgical format in Haydn's The Seven Last Words of Christ in an effort to humanize these men and to reckon with my identity as a black man in this country in relation to this specific scourge of police brutality." He was also inspired by the illustrations of Iranian-American artist Shirin Barghi. (Full article...) -
Image 22Generation Revolution is a 2016 British documentary film directed by Cassie Quarless and Usayd Younis. It follows the stories of Black and Asian activists in London who aim to change the social and political landscape in the capital. The film preceded the inception of the UK's Black Lives Matter movement.
The film premiered at Sheffield Doc/Fest on 14 June 2016. It released on Netflix UK & Ireland on 1 October 2020. (Full article...) -
Image 23Black Software: The Internet and Racial Justice, From the Afronet to Black Lives Matter is a 2019 American book that sets out to understand Black Lives Matter through the six-decade history of racial justice movement organizing online. (Full article...)
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Image 24
Erica Garner-Snipes (May 29, 1990 – December 30, 2017) was an American activist who advocated for police reform, particularly in the use of force during arrests. Garner became involved in activism following the 2014 murder of her father, Eric Garner, after a New York City police officer placed him in a lethal chokehold during an arrest. (Full article...) -
Image 25The George Floyd Justice in Policing Act of 2021 was a policing reform bill drafted by Democrats in the United States Congress. The legislation was introduced in the United States House of Representatives on February 24, 2021. The legislation aims to combat police misconduct, excessive force, and racial bias in policing.
The bill passed the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives on a mostly party-line vote of 220–212, but not the evenly divided but Democratic-controlled Senate amid opposition from Republicans. Negotiations between Republican and Democratic senators on a reform bill collapsed in September 2021. (Full article...)
Did you know...
- ... that Arkansas legislator Denise Jones Ennett took part in a Black Lives Matter protest in front of the Arkansas State Capitol?
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Selected images
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Image 1"Black Lives Matter" on the facade of the Washington National Cathedral, June 10, 2020 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 2Vehicle with a BLM sticker, September 18, 2015 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 4Map depicting rates of police killings by state in the United States in 2018 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 5Protests in May 2020 after George Floyd's death (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 6Protest march in response to the Jamar Clark killing, Minneapolis, Minnesota, November 2015 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 7Al Sharpton led the Commitment March: Get Your Knee Off Our Necks in Washington, D.C., on August 28, 2020 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 8Black Lives Matter protest at Herald Square, Manhattan, November 2014 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 9A Black Lives Matter die-in over rail tracks, protesting alleged police brutality in Saint Paul, Minnesota (September 20, 2015) (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 10Black Lives Matter protest on September 20, 2015, against police brutality in St. Paul, Minnesota (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 11One-year commemoration of the killing of Michael Brown and the Ferguson unrest at Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York, August 2015 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 12An activist holds a "Black Lives Matter" sign outside the Minneapolis Police Fourth Precinct building following the officer-involved killing of Jamar Clark on November 15, 2015 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 13"What happened to 'All Lives Matter'?" sign at a protest against Donald Trump, January 29, 2017 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 14The empty pedestal of the statue of Edward Colston in Bristol. Subject to increasing controversy since the 1990s, when his prior reputation as a philanthropist came under scrutiny due to a growing awareness of his slave trading, in June 2020 the statue was toppled, defaced and pushed into Bristol Harbour. (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 15A Black Lives Matter protest of police brutality in the rotunda of the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota, in December 2014 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 16Protest march in response to the killing of Philando Castile, St. Paul, Minnesota, July 7, 2016 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 18A demonstrator raising awareness of the death of Freddie Gray in Baltimore, April 2015 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 19Protest outside the U.S. Embassy in London, June 7, 2020 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 20Black Lives Matter demonstration in Oakland, California, December 2014 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 21Black Lives Matter protest in Aotea Square, Auckland, June 14, 2020 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 22George Floyd protests at Lafayette Square, Washington D.C., May 30, 2020 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 26Black Lives Matter protester at Macy's Herald Square, November 2014 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 28Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington, D.C., as seen from space on June 8, 2020 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 29Black Lives Matter protest against St. Paul police brutality at Metro Green Line, September 2015 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 30Bernie Sanders and Black Lives Matter activists in Westlake Park, Seattle, August 8, 2015 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 31Demonstration at Christiansborg Slotsplads, Copenhagen, June 7, 2020 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 32Protest in response to the Alton Sterling killing, San Francisco, California, July 8, 2016 (from Black Lives Matter)
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Image 34Ferguson, Missouri, August 17, 2014 (from Black Lives Matter)
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