(ThyBlackMan.com) I am about fairness regardless of who, or what, is on the table. It is very important that while we acknowledge issues in the community, such as mental health, we don’t commit hypocrisy. What we demand of others as human beings cannot be excused amongst our own. When white males commit multiple murders many in the black community see the mental health defense as a scapegoat…an excuse. When Dylan Roof open fire in Emmanuel AME killing 9 black people none of us wanted to hear a single word about his mental health. Let’s be honest, yes, mental health issues are a matter that black people do need to address. There are many of our people that need to seek professional help and we should encourage them to do so. With that being acknowledged we cannot give our people a pass that we don’t give others.
We can’t victimize a killer which takes away from the actual victim that has lost their life, and the loss of their family. As a people, we can’t demand others be accountable for their actions, or their lack of seeking help, while raising the mental health argument with no facts when we kill our own. That is NOT okay, and it doesn’t help the
cause for which we fight. When we commit this matter of hypocrisy we are fueling the argument that we don’t excuse white people when they kill us, but we justify the killing of each other.
On Easter Sunday, April 16, 2017, Steve Stephens decided to approach elder Robert Godwin while on Facebook live and murder him in cold blood on Facebook live. He claimed it was behind a falling out with his girlfriend, and he had several posts on Facebook that were dark indeed. However, the truth is we don’t know all the details of his mental state, we do know he murdered this elder with no regard. He just picked a person with no connection to him nor his life and killed them because he was going through something. People that is not okay, and there is no excuse for it. Following Mr. Godwin’s murder our people took to social media to discuss mental illness, and the fact that our community need to address that issue. Well, wrong timing.
The bottom line is we need to address that there is a member of our community that is now deceased for NO REASON. A family is suffering for no valid reason. Mr. Godwin wasn’t in a hospital suffering, no he was innocently shot by a bullet directed at him for NO REASON. We can’t even say ignorant fools were shooting and a random bullet caught him. No, Steve Stephens got out of his car and killed him. If Steven Stephens were a white man we would not be discussing mental health. If he was a police officer, we most certainly wouldn’t be having that discussion.
We can’t afford to be hypocrites about this at all. It was unfortunate to see members of our community put a mental health argument that wasn’t validated against that of accountability. Are we to become liken to those that would oppress us? Our integrity is often based on the stance we take with our own. I don’t give the mental health out to whites that murder, and I won’t give it to my own. Those in the mental health profession will continue to fight for our people to acknowledge that they need help, and seek it. Yet, in addition we must understand that every murder isn’t an act of mental illness. There is ugly, sinister and evil in this world. Black people should be very aware of that fact. There are some people that decide to inflict pain and harm. To those that would argue even that is mental illness…
I say to you that is a messed up moral compass, a lack of humanity, and in some cases a poor rearing job on the part of the parents. These things must be understood so that we don’t water down mental health. If everything is passed off as a mental health problem, then those that have mental health challenges won’t be taken seriously at all. Instead of trying to justify what Steven Stephens did we as a people should hold him accountable when speaking of the matter regardless of the fact that he killed himself. We must not stand in hypocrisy on matters such as these. We must remember the victim is Mr. Godwin who lost his life by no fault of his own. We must remember the suffering of his family. We can’t condone the murdering of our people…by our people and give them the justification we simply won’t tolerate from others. Period.
Staff Writer; Christian Starr
May connect with this sister over at Facebook; https://www.facebook.com/christian.pierre.9809 and also Twitter; http://twitter.com/MrzZeta.
