How it Went Down Response

I am reading How it Went Down for Grade 10 English. The book is about this kid who gets shot when he goes into a corner store and this white guy pulls up in his car and shoots him because he thought he was robbing the place. The kid dies but the story is from all different perspectives so you get to see how each person experienced the shooting and what they think happens.

I think that it reminds me a lot of the shootings that happen between the police and unarmed Black men, especially in Canada and the United States. These shootings are usually dismissed as justified even when the people being shot were unarmed. Some examples are:
Trayvon Martin
Eric Garner

Tamir Rice
Freddie Gray

Michael Brown

These cases lead to lots of outrage from some of the communities where these young men are being shot, especially amongst the Black community where they are much more likely to be killed than any other race. There seems to be some awareness of the issue and yet when people take social action, like when Colin Kaepernick started the Take a Knee campaign, there is criticism for them trying to make change.  I think that the growing awareness of the issue brought by groups like Black Lives Matter helps to bring attention but that it continues to be an issue in Canada and the United States and that more training and education for police officers is essential.