The phrase, “black lives matter,” is true. It is absolutely true that black lives matter. There can be no doubt that black lives matter. To deny that black lives matter is an absurdity, and the vast majority of people recognize this and affirm it.
What, then, is the problem with the phrase that “black lives matter” when it is used as a quasi-mandatory public confession, a slogan, or a test of allegiance to the fact that black lives matter?
The problem with the phrase is that it reinforces the problem it seeks to alleviate. In converting into a confession, slogan, or mark of allegiance the truth that black lives matter, one re-segregates and therefore reinforces the problem which harms people of color. How does it do this?
Everytime people convert the truth that black lives matter into a slogan, the problem of racism is reinforced. This is why many people reject this slogan, not because they reject black people, or because they subtly think black lives don’t matter, but because they intuit that the problem of racism is being reinforced by the phrase. To reject racism and segregation is to see through the lie, the falsehood that distinction based on the color of skin has any place in responsible public discourse.
Peace and unity cannot be established on the affirmation of the very categories that create racism in the first place.
If segregation based on skin color is wrong, then alignment based on skin color is equally wrong. This fact is the elephant in the room. Many people are raised on the idea of some sort of color-based identity, and therefore their very sense of self is erroneously attached to the color of their skin. The solution is not then to erect some sort of color-based solidarity, but to align with people who understand the truth that skin-color is not a valid category for any kind of intentional or non-accidental social grouping.
The problem of violence against people who have dark skin is therefore a human problem, not a “black problem” or a “white problem.” It is everyone’s problem equally. The problem of color division at the conceptual level is that it is a false construct that produces both alignment and therefore division based on skin color, which necessarily produces division at the cultural and political level. The solution is therefore to systematically teach and train people not to see past color, but to see that color literally has zero place in any kind of meaningful distinction-making between human beings.
Black lives matter. But on what basis? Their blackness? No. People do not matter because of the color of their skin. People matter because they are created in God’s image and likeness. At no point does God divide or unite people on the basis of the color of their skin. To seek to divide or align people based on skin color is therefore to oppose God, to oppose His truth and His love. To divide or align people based on skin color is to introduce a foreign and alien principle into one’s thoughts about humanity. The idea of color-based race is a tool of the Devil.
Black human lives matter not because they are black, but because they are human lives. The belief that there are different color-based races of people is unbiblical and not consistent with Christian teaching. The bible speaks of cultural groups and ethnic diversity, but not in terms of race. The idea of color-based race is therefore a false construct, and is itself the essence of racism. Racism is therefore literally delusional. To hold to the belief that there are different "kinds" of men based on skin color is itself the true and underlying racism. If people hate or love each other under the false idea that there is such a thing as a race, that is racism.
God divided men into tribes and nations, and so there are different cultural groups and therefore ethnic diversity, but this is a far cry from the reductive notion that there is a kind of man called "black man" and a kind of man called "white man." There are Irish, Scottish, Chinese, Japanese, Greek, Persian, Hatian, Dominican, Ethiopian, Nigerian, Russian, Polish, etc., but there are no skin-color based "races." God made ethnic diversity through division of languages which produced accidental divisions of heredity and customs, but the idea of dividing man in absolutist categories based on skin color is not Biblical and not made by God. There is no such thing as a "black man" or a “black culture” or a "white man" or a “white culture.” To believe there are these things is itself the problem because it is rooted in illegitimate social constructs and not in God. There are men with darker or lighter skin who come from this or that place and have this or that custom, but there is no "kind" of man or culture that is some color.
A truer refutation of racism, the idea of finding justice for a black or white person therefore makes no sense because there is no such thing as a “black person” or a “white person.” There are only people, human beings equally created in God’s image who through the accidents of history just happened to pick up some color diversity in their skin tones, diversities which do not equate to different “kinds” of human beings. Problems that effect people with darker colors of skin is therefore a human problem, not a “black person” problem, it is everyone’s problem; it is our problem and not their problem, and is not solved by affirming the value of blackness, but by executing justice in reference to universal human nature.
This is why many people of good conscience reject the phrase, “black lives matter,” not because of a reduction of the value of this or that person’s life, just not establishing it in reference to the presence or absence of this or that color. And they are correct to do so. Justice is either blind or it is not justice. Black lives matter, but the blackness is accidental and so does not matter.
The lie and crime of people with lighter skin against people with darker skin was to convince each other that their lighter or darker skin mattered, and then to erect criminal and inhumane social constructs and brutal mistreatment on this basis. But, like a Trojan Horse, associating “mattering” with skin color is a travesty for it smuggles in the Godless lie. Sadly, this lie that skin color has intrinsic meaning is still being spread, and this is why the phrase "black lives matter" harms black people.
In conclusion, to attempt to erect a slogan, public confession, or affirmation of solidarity on the basis of the accidental features of a human person, whether their height, weight, sex, eye, hair, or skin color, wealth or poverty, place of origin, or any of these kinds of things is to reject and exclude the possibility of justice and to ensure that racism will never end, harming the very people it is attempting to affirm. Due to the constant reinforcement of sensual paradigms and cultural ignorance, however, the ideation of color-based race is a difficult lie to see through, and it takes courage and integrity to see through it. But it must be done for the sake of truth and love, for diversity of color does not equate to diversity of kinds of people.
-Fr. Joshua Schooping.
