"All Lives Matter" - the biggest lie conservatives ever told
George Floyd died on May 20, 2020, murdered in public by the Minneapolis police. Outraged Americans took up the cause of bringing attention to police brutality with the chant “Black Lives Matter,” a slogan originally used to protest the murder of Travon Martin. Millions participated in marches around the nation and across the globe in hopes of ending the systemic racism which has, for too long, put people’s lives and livelihoods in danger.
Backlash soon followed via the “All Lives Matter” movement where conservatives claimed that the “Black Lives Matter” slogan was divisive because everyone’s life mattered and there shouldn’t be carve outs for special groups.
Now, five years later conservative republicans control the presidency, Congress and the Supreme Court. So, how’s that “All Lives Matter” claim holding up?
In July, after Trump joked about alligators eating unauthorized immigrants in an Everglades prison, the National Republican Congressional Committee started selling T-shits with a picture of a grinning reptile and the slogan “ICE with a bite!”
In August, Representative Mike Flood of Nebraska held a town hall filled with citizens angry about his vote for the tax and spending bill, H.R. 1, which slashes services and gives tax breaks to the wealthy. “Do you think that people who are 28 years old that can work and refuse to work should get free health care?” he demanded. “Yes!” the crowd screamed at him. Because all lives matter means every life matters, even that of a healthy 28-year-old who is one bad step off a curb from needing treatment for a broken ankle and the five-figure bill that comes with it.
The badly named ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ takes a machete to services many Americans rely on. With all the hoops citizens will have to jump through to stay enrolled in the Affordable Care Act/Obamacare, including shorter enrollment periods and no automatic renewals, the paperwork requirements alone will cause lapses in coverage. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the resulting lack of care could cause up to 22,000 deaths annually.
SNAP funding has been reduced by $186 billion over the next 10 years and requirements have changed. Now refugees, asylum seekers and victims of human trafficking are no longer eligible for food stamps. What exactly do conservatives have against victims of human trafficking? Don’t their lives matter enough to provide them with food?
A medical study published in The Lancet, estimates that USAID programs for nutritional assistance, maternal mortality and combating tuberculosis, malaria and other tropical diseases has saved 90 million lives over the last 20 years. With Trump’s drastic cuts to the program, statisticians estimate that 14 million people will die from the loss of services between now and 2030.
When all lives don’t matter, safety becomes a privilege reserved for the rich and survival a gamble for everyone else. Compassion, decency and humanity are just line items to be deleted on a whim.
But these examples are on the legislative and executive sides of our government. What about the Supreme Court? Do our esteemed justices believe that all lives matter? That we all stand equal under the protection provided by the Constitution and the law?
In June, the six conservative justices voted to allow the Trump administration to deport undocumented immigrants to countries such as El Salvador and Sudan where they could be jailed and tortured. Interestingly, John Roberts, Amy Coney Barrett, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Clarence Thomas were all raised in the Catholic church. (Neil Gorsuch currently attends an Episcopal church). Undoubtably, all six have read the stories in the gospels detailing how Jesus was arrested, tried by a corrupt court, tortured and crucified. (Note—the Bible portrays this as a bad thing.)
I’m pretty sure Jesus would have been all in on the “All Lives Matter” movement but, unlike most conservatives, he would have been sincere about it. If he was here now, he would put his values into action by overturning the money-changing tables wherever those Alligator-Alcatraz T-shirts are sold.
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