Do all lives really matter? As gruesome as it may sound—they do not.

As a black female, I have experienced the injustices towards not only African-Americans but minorities in general. It is truly mind-boggling to watch the men and women who are supposed to serve and protect me, assault and kill my brothers and sisters.

Solving this issue is not an easy task—it is perhaps the most difficult challenge that America must face. The Civil Rights Movement has proved to be one of the most arduous tasks, being that it has metamorphosed into several different forms over the years.

Of course, I would love to solve this problem, however, this is not a problem I will face alone. It requires the participation of not only me or the black community, but also our allies that believe in the equality of all races. It requires the participation of those who believe and want to enforce that every single life matters, no matter where you come from. This is not a movement that a single person should undertake, but a movement of unity.

As Dr. Martin Luther King once stated, “Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever.” In order to confront the face of racism, the black-on-black crime must stop. It is contradictory to support the Black Lives Matter movement and kill the same people that the oppressors oppress. It is illogical to support the Black Lives Matter movement today, but kill your brothers and sisters tomorrow. Black-on-black crime is the core of disunity, which hinders the movement altogether. The issue with violence is that it takes away from the significance of the movement—it is a vile, virulent substance which contaminates any and everything in the vicinity. If and only if black-on-black crime ceases can we face this tumultuous trial. It must go.

As a community, African Americans should not antagonize police officers. As a result of the crime within our community, we are often labeled as “hoodlums” and “thugs”. Just because others form judgments based on a very small percentage of us does not mean that we should do the same. Let’s not allow police brutality to tarnish our respect for the people in blue who adhere to the law in order to protect us every day. We the oppressed should not fill our hearts with hate, but we must fill it with love, because that is what will set us free.

The police brutality that the media captured is the emblem of the racism that has been poisoning our society for centuries. Not only do we need to band together as a community of all races, but we need to stay informed. A direct way to change the injustices is to pay attention to who we elect. We need to start electing officials who support our cause and understand the importance of our movement. Voting is powerful when done by a mass. Better yet, training should be emphasized. Statistically, police officers spend more time with firearms during training than they do learning how to diffuse situations with different races.

Furthermore, let’s work to lessen the strength of Fair Police Contracts which make the police nearly untouchable when these killings happen. Let’s take a stand for the hundreds of deaths that occur every year at the hands of the police.

It is important that we are not sending the wrong message. The Black Lives Matter movement is not a racist movement, and it is crucial that we do not mislead others. We do not hate white people, nor do we believe that African American lives are of more importance than others. The movement is drawing attention to the fact that in the past, our lives have not mattered to some. It is a way to state that they must be valued because they are valuable. It is a way to state that all lives cannot matter until black lives matter.