In the late 60s, I supported the Black Panthers and most of all supported them owning and displaying firearms. And I supported King. My remark about progress is a function of my thinking about virtually anything: empiricism. What works is what is justified. King and the non-violent protest movement produced change. The Panthers didn’t.
Still, back then a black person owning and displaying firearms meant something very different from today. It was a statement about a reality of the threat. The chance of a black person being coerced, attacked or killed by ANY white person, police or civilian, was exponentially higher than it is today. And in most states and jurisdictions there were very often strict laws about gun ownership and, as I’m sure you know, even laws specifically forbidding blacks to own guns.
It really MEANT something for a black person to assert the right and privilege to own and defend themselves with firearms. Today, the chances of a black person being killed is most likely by their own gun or guns in the black community. As it is for a white person.
The real issue is that gun ownership is not going to stop the main source of white violence against blacks: the police. If anything, it has a good chance of liberating them from any responsibility and forced change.
And blacks becoming part of the cult of guns and gun violence that defines most of the fascists and racists in this country is something the fascists and racists dream of. The Aryan Nations and other such organizations are dying for the chance to be able to say they are rising up to fight the violent takeover of America by non-whites. And Trump and his minions were trying to tell just the story by portraying the BLM protests as violent insurrections and lies about armed blacks.
The (hopefully soon to be defunct) NRA is no home for minorities. But they would love to be seen as now a diverse and welcoming organization for black gun owners. If for no other reason that to continue to undermine gun controls and, for most of them, let things get to where they can pave the way for a fascist takeover of all or part of this country.
Other white European countries all have extremely strict gun control. The ones such as France and England with large minority populations exhibit absolutely and proportionally a tiny fraction of death-by-police or death-by-white than the USA. They are not without their features of systemic racism and racial intimidation by police, etc. But one thing they are effectively without is an epidemic of death by firearm in minority communities.
That state would be a vast improvement here. Escalating the fight, as it were, will only leave the lesser armed and lesser numbers more exposed to a worsening of things.
