Attorney Benjamin Crump (who has be retained by the Blake family) posted this picture of Jacob Blake with his 3 sons on his instagram page and wrote
“This is Jacob Blake. He is 29 years old and a devoted father. Kenosha WI police shot him several times in the back tonight after he was breaking up a fight between two women. His THREE SONS were in the car he was getting into when they shot him!! His sons will be traumatized forever. As a father myself, I am horrified and disgusted. We cannot let this continue! We cannot let officers violate their duty to PROTECT us. Our children deserve better!!“
At his postgame interview, after scoring 30 pts 10 assists and 6 rebounds in 28 mins and a winning effort, Lebron James addressed the entire incident,
“So you’re telling me that there was no way to subdue that gentleman or detain him before the firing of guns. You’re lying to every African-American ever Black Person in the community.... If you watch the video there were multiple moments where if they wanted to they could’ve tackled him they could’ve grabbed him, they could’ve done that so why did it have to get to a point where we see the guns firing. His family is there the kids are there, it’s in broad daylight. And if that video is not being taken by that person across the street, do we know if we even see that video ? .....We are scared as Black People in America. Black Men, Black Women, Black Kids, we are terrified.”
https://www.espn.com/video/clip?id=29735258
After tying the playoff series with the Houston Rockets and scoring 26 pts 6 rebs and 3 assists in a winning effort, during his postgame interview Chris Paul addressed the incident as well,
“I just want to send my prayers out to Jacob Blake and his family.....we said we were going to continue to speak on the social injustice and the things that continue to happen to our people, it’s not right.”
https://twitter.com/complexsports/status/1298030906024906753?s=21
Attorney Crump told the Journal Sentinel. “Nobody’s more devastated than his three sons....You can only imagine the psychological problems these babies are going to have for the rest of their lives,"
Somehow miraculously Jacob survived and is in stable condition according to a statement by the family, but make no mistake, the police (who are now on paid administrative leave) did not intend for him to leave there alive. Their aim was to kill him
This is the official GoFundMe created for Jacob Blake, his medical care, his family, and more.
He is going to need so much support.
"As we fight for justice and understanding, our family has and will face many trials during this time," the family wrote on the GoFundMe website. "Jacob Blake is a loving father of six that deserves proper medical attention and legal representation."
Just FYI: The reason the family and the attorney Crump are continuously stating that Jacob was a loving father of six and a good person is because of the expected demonization that routinely follows each and every time a Black Man or Black Woman is killed by the police. This happened with George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Sandra Bland, Terence Crutcher, Eric Garner, Philando Castile, Alton Sterling, Akai Gurley, Stephon Clarke, Andrew Kearse, and countless others, the media floods the airways with justifications of why the person who was shot by the police was somehow at fault.
A Black Man shouldn’t have to be perfect or exceptional or a college graduate or a husband or a father in order to explain why he didn’t deserve to be shot 7 times in the back by police but I digress.
This is exactly why NBA players have been taking a knee. Why they have been wearing messages on the backs of their jerseys. Why they have collectively let their voices be heard during this entire NBA bubble season, despite the barrage of criticism and vitriol they have received.
Donald Trump called NBA players “very nasty and very dumb” for kneeling during the National Anthem.
Right wing conservative political pundit Charlie Kirk said,
“Hilarious to see Black NBA players who make millions a year take a knee to try and tell us black people can’t succeed in America,” he tweeted. “Kick them out of the league. Done watching the NBA.”
Former NFL player, coach, current commentator and Hall of Famer Mike Ditka said,
"If you can't respect our national anthem, get the hell out of the country,“ Ditka said during an interview with TMZ Sports. ”That's the way I feel. Of course, I'm old fashioned. So, I'm only going to say what I feel.
When Michael Vick goes to prison for more time for killing dogs than just about every police officer did for killing unarmed Black Men or Black Women in the past 3 decades, it’s should be crystal clear what the issue is.
How is it possible for so many people to still not understand that this has nothing to do with the flag or with veterans or they simply dedicated to purposely misrepresenting and redirecting the issue
I interviewed Joakim Noah for my show The Rematch on FliTV,
https://www.fli.tv/joakim-noah-interview
and he explained to me exactly why he chose “Justice“ to go on the back of his jersey, In his words,
“Because everyone deserves justice. Everybody does. And the truth is that right now and for a long time, there are a lot of people who don’t {receive justice} I wanted to use that because everyone deserves human rights. All of my heroes have been fighting for justice. Some have died for justice..... and I hope that a lot of these people who have died when you think of {George} Floyd and Breonna Taylor, I really hope that they can get their justice”
And when you watch the clip, you can see Joakim almost get emotional while saying these words. It’s not just a trendy thing to do as some have suggested, this means something to him. And seeing NBA players take stances like this and verbalize to the media why this is important to them as Joakim Noah did, as LeBron did, as Kawhi Leonard did, as Jerami Grant did, as Tobias Harris, Sterling Brown, CJ McCollum, Donovan Mitchell, Marcus Smart, Kyle Kuzma and so many others did, as coaches such as Doc Rivers and Alvin Gentry did, it should be crystal clear what the issue is.
What the NBA and WNBA has done this season represents one of the most collective athlete activists movements since the 1960s. This has pushed entire institutions and industries to reckon with a racist history and institute programs and initiatives that weren’t previously there.
For example: The NBA recently announced that
“All 30 NBA teams will contribute a combined $300 million over the next decade to fund the NBA Foundation, a new charitable initiative dedicated to greater economic empowerment in the Black community.”
NBA Coaches For Racial Justice was established by Lloyd Pierce and now every coach in the NBA is working with grassroots organizations in their respective cities
I also interviewed Stan Van Gundy for my show The Rematch on FliTV and he broke it down for those who still seem to be confused on the meaning and importance of the players taking a knee.
https://www.fli.tv/stan-van-gundy-interview
“If you love something, you want it to be better....As a parent, you’re going to love your kid no matter what, but you’re not going to just let them do whatever they want to do and not say anything or do anything because if you really love your kids, you want them to be the best that they can be and when they’re not doing that, you want to try to correct their course. That’s what the players are doing. They’re not saying I don’t want to live here or I hate America, they’re saying I want it to be the best that it can be.”
NBA players took a respectful stand together. Not against police but against police brutality and they did it together as an entire league. Coaches, referees, staff, while players, foreign players, everyone taking a stand together while utilizing the media to bring further attention to specific cases of police brutality and calling for police accountability such as bringing Breonna Taylor and George Floyd’s murderers to justice.
With the horrifying shooting of Jacob Blake and the fact that none of the police officers had body cams although Kenosha city technically requires them for all of their officers. And just as in the case with George Floyd, if it weren’t for a civilian‘s recording, the “facts” that people wait for the police to come out with, almost certainly wouldn’t have resulted in any officer being held accountable. It is more than evident that we still have a long way to go.
