I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe, I simply cannot breathe. It is an inalienable right, the right to breathe. It is a natural body function to breathe without thought of where the next breath is coming from. Take your knee off my neck, my hands are cuff behind my back, my lips kiss the ground, whatever threat you perceived has dissipated, for I am incapacitated. Take your knee off my neck.
Help! I am being attacked in Central Park by a black man because I do not want to follow the law and keep my dog leashed. I cannot breathe, take your knee off my neck. Honey, I am going for my jog never to return. I cannot breathe, take your knee off my neck.
The names, George Floyd, Christopher Cooper, Ahmaud Arbery, are new but the scenarios are not. From the foundation of this country these scenarios have continuously played out. However, previously we were limited by our local media. Now, with the advancements in technology the scenarios are exposed to the masses.
To borrow the title of Michelle Alexander’s book, The New Jim Crow, so we have to be new in our tactics and responses. We have to put our faith and prayer into action. We not only have to vote, but we have to begin lobbying for laws that will lead to the charge and arrest for those who take our breath away. We have to lobby for laws that will lead to the arrest of those making false reports. Some states have that law, now let’s lobby that the law is enacted in all states and enforced against all violators equally.
Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. explained that injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. Do not allow the injustices of the Amy Coopers and the Gregory and Travis McMichaels in this world to distort our view of our white brothers and sisters, and officers who understand their destiny is inextricably tied with our destiny.
Let justice ring, I want to breathe, let justice ring, take your knee off my neck. As long as you have your knee on my fellow human’s neck, then you have your knee on my neck. TAKE YOUR KNEE OFF MY NECK I WANT TO BREATHE.
by Cynthia L. Thompson