Lynching With Another Name

When thinking of what led up to the 1992 race riots most would initially think of Rodney King and the four police officers that were acquitted for beating him profusely. This event, although was a key piece in the ignition of the riots was not a surprise or a sudden revelation of police brutality or racism. The Rodney King beating, due to George Holliday recording it, was different due to its prevalence in the media. But racism is not something that was new during the 90s nor is it something that has disappeared in the present. 

Jim Crow laws, lynching, slavery: they were all atrocities that prefaced the LA riots. Things didn't just explode when the verdict of the police officers was released. There was always much more that was lying beneath that led to the riots. Lynching is seen throughout history. The lynching of the black man is now in other words the police brutality inflicted on the black man. Lynchings were family events where people would go out and have roasts. Parents would bring their children and hoist them on their shoulders to get a better look at what was going on. People would buy postcards of lynching images and even buy audio recordings of the screams of the people being lynched.

Lynching is still seen in present day and that is through the deaths of people like Butchie Yarber. He was shot 30 times in a Walmart parking lot. Butchie Yarber was unarmed. In an article in The New Yorker Carvel Wallace states, “How would it be possible to get along in a city where the police operate above the law, where African-Americans suffer daily under the lash of a crooked justice system that echoes the brutality of slave catchers and overseers?” Lynching is echoed throughout history into present day, it only evolved and has a different name. 

By: Victoria R.