I'll never be able to actively support an openly Marxist organization; but, I know that we have record numbers of younger people who don't know anything about history and think that Marx had some good ideas.
Even though I hate Marxism, I can imagine people who aren't Marxists viewing support of BLM as a coalition to push for criminal justice reform. Still, I would find that to be misguided. There are plenty of organizations who are doing more than nothing in that space and that's better than BLM.
Since this is mostly a movement of people my age or younger, I'm guessing that most of the passionate supporters of BLM didn't get involved after the Trayvon Martin shooting. We all know that George Floyd killing is what spurred the recent flood of support and that's one of the more legitimate reasons to rally in support. The Eric Garner killing created a lot of more than justifiable anger.
I can still understand to an extent why support for the organization grew after Micheal Brown and Jacob Blake. Still, this shows a lot of irresponsibility. "Hands up, don't shoot." turned out to be a lie that a lot of people still believe. People still believe the narrative that Jacob Blake was unarmed and trying to break up a fight before the cops shot him in the back with his kids in the back of the car. The story later turned out to be that Jacob Blake started the altercation, the mother of the children called the police mentioning Blake by name and informing the police that he had stolen and crashed her cars before, Blake had a felony warrant for violent assault, Blake was armed with a knife, survived two taser hits from police, and was shot in the process of attempting to kidnap the children in a stolen vehicle. Even if you still think that the police shouldn't have shot him, would you really burn down a town in support of this guy?
Still, the response to Andrew Tekle Sundberg being killed by police by BLM should be the latest in a line of questionable responses. There's never been any confusion about whether or not Sundberg was armed. The police were called on him because he was spraying bullets into the apartment of a woman of color and her children. He was trying to murder this woman and he clearly didn't mind if he took her kids out too.
Just go back a little further to the shooting of Ma'Khia Bryant. Bryant was in a stabbing motion again an unarmed black girl before the officer took action.
The riots and the looting that happened in Philadelphia were in response to the police shooting a knife wielding black man. The police were called by a black woman who feared for her life. Everybody who the man was threatening before the cops arrived was black.
Maybe you will still just say that it's never okay for a cop to kill a black man and it doesn't matter if the man were armed or dangerous and it doesn't even matter if the cop was black. Maybe you'll say that. But, the trend of these last few cases, including Jacob Blake, is that a black man was shot in the process of endangering the lives of other black people. In fact, in response to Sundberg, BLM decided to hold a rally in his honor outside of his would-be victim's apartment complex, blocked her from entry, and mocked and scolded her for taking umbrage at the fact that they were holding a vigil for the man who tried to murder her and her children.
So, maybe change the name of the organization. They clearly don't believe that all black lives matter. With very few exceptions, BLM stays silent when it comes to innocent black people. They'll march a tear stuff down for a man who has been credibility accused of rape several times; but, when evidence comes out saying that a black man who was executed in Arkansas was probably innocent, they've got literally nothing to say. They'll hold a vigil for a man who attempted to murder a mother and her two children in their own home; but, a story comes out about a black man who spent fourteen years in prison and forty on the sex offender registry over a false charge of raping a white woman, they've got literally nothing to say. Seriously, try to find any reference to Anthony Broadwater in relation to BLM. BLM spent more energy defending Jussie Smollett than they have talking about legitimately innocent people who had their lives taken or destroyed by our criminal justice system.
I think anybody who still uses the Black Lives Matter symbols and rhetoric needs to ask themselves why they're supporting a organization that regularly cares more about the black person holding the gun that it does about the black life that he's threatening to take.
If your answer is something along the lines of, "They're the best we got and they're the highest profile organization working on this issue." you're only half right. No, they're not the best we've got and they're not our only option. They are the highest profile; but, we should do everything in our power to change that.
It's time to take those three words away from a corrupt and morally vacuous organization.