Ellington

I believe that everything doesn't happen for a reason. Sometimes, reason is thrown out the window, and one simply becomes afflicted with either fortunate or unfortunate luck. Often, there is no sound reasoning to explain scoring a last-minute one-night stand with a gorgeous woman during last call or being hit by a bus after scoring a last-minute one-night stand with that gorgeous woman during last call. However, there are times in which some events happen for an obvious reason. The laws of cause and effect are clear. As Sir Isaac Newton stated, "To every action there is always opposed an equal reaction."

The gunmen in Dallas and Baton Rouge sought an equal reaction to the wave of "out of the closet" police brutality via camera technology. While we, the general public, vehemently disagree and condemn the reaction, we fail to acknowledge or give credence to the reason or action that led to the reaction. Let's set aside the fact that both gunmen were veterans who more than likely suffered from post traumatic stress disorder. Let's also set aside the fact that the intersection of being a veteran and African American made them less likely to seek help in combating PTSD. Even though these components are immensely important factors, the driving force behind it was the action of police brutality.

Police brutality or genocide is a multi-generational cancer that is still affecting the African American community, and like any successful disease, the central goal is for the host carrying the disease to die. When a host is infected, stopping or curing the cancer becomes the number-one priority, and while searching for a slew of cures, trial by error occurs.

Eventually, if the cancer metastasizes, desperation sets in, and with desperate times come desperate measures. There is a small sect of the African American community turning toward experimental medication, i.e., violence via vigilante vengeance, rooted in desperation, to cure the cancer of police brutality.

Even before Rodney King got beat like an 1845 Mississippi runaway, African Americans have continuously witnessed the lack of punishment done to law-enforcement officers after injustice takes place. In the case of many victims of unjust brutality or murder at the hands of law enforcement, not much or any justice awaits them in the courtrooms.

Hell, no one has still yet to answer for the murders of Eric Garner or Mike Brown. Neither case even made it past the initial grand-jury proceedings. The blatant stripping away of due-process liberties in both cases has set a precedent that equity cannot be obtained in the courtroom.

The lack of grand-jury oversight fully displayed the conflict of interest between law enforcement and prosecutors. The prosecution in both cases exhibited grand-jury practices that are alien to many in the legal community, including conflicting witness testimony and allowing both potential defendants to share their side without threat of cross-examination.

Grand jury and trial-jury acquittals of police officers or "wanna-be" police officers (see George Zimmerman) have left many in the African American community turning toward one another and asking, "Where else can we find justice?" Well, for a few, it comes in the form of revenge aka "an eye for an eye." 
 What both gunmen did to invoke their own form of justice was neither heroic nor valiant. However, the action or the reason behind it was one of hopelessness and desperation. So, even though 99.9 percent of the African American population would not commit the crime, they fully comprehend the action that ultimately contributed to the reason for the gunmen's reactions.

In a perfect world, black folks being shot with their hands up wouldn't exist, protesting wouldn't be necessary, and violence wouldn't be a last-ditch effort to some in order to seek justice. However, we live in a flawed world where police brutality is alive and well, protest is very necessary, and violence begets violence.

Unfortunately, to those who fall victim to violent acts (on both sides), it doesn't matter if you are innocent and righteous. Violent acts are committed with very little thought as to what the consequences may be for the violent acts. The gunmen who murdered the officers in Dallas and Baton Rouge lacked consequential sound minds, as did the officers who brutally murdered Philando Castile and Alton Sterling. Action, reaction.

Leslie McLemore II is a Jackson native, now in Washington, D.C. He is a graduate of Jackson State University, North Carolina Central University and American University Washington.