Media playback is unsupported on your gadget
However how did it go from a social media post to a global phenomenon, and where does it go now?
The names most associated with Black Lives Matter are not its leaders however the victims who have actually drawn attention to the enormous issues of racism this country grapples with: George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Eric Garner, Michael Brown, to name a couple of.
There was outrage when he was found not guilty of murder, and a Facebook post entitled “Black Lives Matter” caught a mood and sparked action.
Image copyright
BLM LA chapter
An early Black Lives Matter presentation in Beverly Hills following the acquittal of Goerge Zimmerman for the murder of Trayvon Martin.
If calls for justice for Trayvon Martin lit the spark for Black Lives Matter, it was the death of Michael Brown a year later on that actually brought the movement to national attention.
The unarmed teen had actually been shot dead by an officer in Ferguson, Missouri and Black Lives Matter took to the streets, typically in mad conflict with the cops.
” When Dr King went to prison, just 55 individuals revealed up,” Ambassador Young remembers.
Image copyright
Getty Images
Ambassador Andrew Young, seated to the right of Martin Luther King Jr with other civil rights leaders
