Black Lives Matter??: Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg Scolds Employees Promoting ‘All Lives Matter’ At Company HQ
The Black Lives Matter movement has received plenty of backlash, with one recent example being employees who physically erased “black lives matter” and replaced it with “all lives matter” on the walls of the company’s Menlo Park headquarters. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been aware of this, following several incidents of this happening, and Zuckerberg, according to Gizmodo, finally publicly expressed his disappointment and frustration with what some of his employees are doing to others’ free speech. On top of that, Mark also corrected many incorrect assumptions that “black lives matter” means that other lives don’t matter.
“Despite my clear communication at Q&A last week that this was unacceptable, and messages from several other leaders from across the country, this has happened again,” Zuckerberg wrote in his memo addressed to Facebook employees. “I was already very disappointed by this disrespectful behavior before, but after my communication I now consider this malicious as well.”
“Black Lives Matter” has been crossed out on the walls of the Menlo Park Facebook HQ several times, which apparently consists primarily of white men. The phrase “all lives matter” was created in opposition to the Black Lives Matter movement. The #BlackLivesMatter hashtag was originally created by Opal Tometi, Patrisse Cullors and Alicia Garza, three black, queer women who are rarely mentioned and credited as its originators, after 17-year-old Trayvon Martin’s murder trial. George Zimmerman, the man who shot and killed Trayvon, was not convicted.
Mark Zuckerberg went on to explain what some people seem to misinterpret about the BLM movement. “There are specific issues affecting the black community in the United States, coming from a history of oppression and racism,” he wrote. “‘Black Lives Matter’ doesn’t mean other lives don’t — it’s simply asking that the black community also achieves the justice they deserve.”
In addition to “all lives matter” being created to dismantle BLM, Tactical Magic, a branding agency based in Memphis, launched a national pro-police campaign that they called “blue lives matter” in October of 2015. It was created to honor the men and women in law enforcement who risk their lives everyday, feeling that the Black Lives Matter movement was anti-police, while its supporters say it is only anti-police brutality.
“This effort to Co-Opt the Black Lives Matter Movement is totally unnecessary,” Scot Esdaile, President of Connecticut’s NAACP, told NBC Connecticut. A few hundred billboards were created in support, with the hashtag #THANKUBLU written on them. Some supporters were involved in a recent boycott of Beyonce after she performed her song “Formation” at the Super Bowl, which is basically this generation’s version of James Brown’s “Say It Loud – I’m Black and I’m Proud.”
As explained by Garza, “#BlackLivesMatter doesn’t mean your life isn’t important–it means that Black lives, which are seen as without value within White supremacy, are important to your liberation. Given the disproportionate impact state violence has on Black lives, we understand that when Black people in this country get free, the benefits will be wide-reaching and transformative for society as a whole.”
Mark Zuckerberg also wants to encourage Facebook employees to educate themselves on the Black Lives Matter movement and what it really means by attending a company town hall meeting on March, 4, 2016. Facebook has stated that diversity is an important goal for them, as most of the company’s employees are white men, with the second-highest demographic being Asian. Meaning, in 2013, nearly 91 percent of the company’s American employees were either white or Asian.
This Black Lives Matter movement, which has become a network, has been growing and expanding ever since it was first created, and has caught on globally. The BLM network does not look as if it’s going away anytime soon.
[Photo by David Ramos/Scott Olson/Getty Images]
