Featured Letter: America has put justice to sleep

How long must we continue to endure daily abuses, daily mistreatment and daily injustices? How many more of our fathers and brothers do we have to bury that are being murdered by the hands of a few “bad apples” in our law enforcement departments and these “Zimmerman-style” vigilantes?

Even our women today are being killed under these same circumstances. There’s only so much that we as a people can take, and the fact of the matter is we are at the breaking point. The minds of African Americans have been so tipped in such a way that what you see in society is an imbalance as a result of the deprivation of justice. When you have liberty but not justice then there’s no joy in being free because the only reason that people are joyous is that there is justice present. However, when justice is denied the balance of the mind is tipped. Justice should always be present. It should be there when we lay down to sleep and there to greet us when we awake. 

People sleep, but justice should never sleep. Unfortunately in this day and age, America has put justice to sleep. They sent Michael Vick to prison. There was no justification for the way the dogs were treated; we all know that it was unjust. They have laws against animal cruelty. They are quick to punish anyone that harms an animal; they have more respect and give a dog more justice. 

So we as African Americans get the message that what America is telling us is that Dogs’ Lives Matter, not ours. What America is telling us is that a black life is beneath the life of a dog or a cat. Yet, does this call for rioting, looting, destruction of property? Of course not. We wouldn’t dare mimic how America was built, rioting like the Boston Tea Party or the theft of property like the taking land from my Native Indian ancestors. I know it is hypocritical to tell someone not to do what you have done and continue to do. However, we shouldn’t stoop down to their level. Let’s not advocate nor participate in looting, rioting and the destruction of property. That would only help them in their narrative describing us as animals. They want to call us animals but won’t give us the justice that they give even to animals. 

Justice is going to the dogs.

Mr. Hobson is a former Riverhead resident and a graduate of Riverhead High School.