Dear Sir,

“The media is the most powerful entity on earth. They have the power to make the innocent guilty and to make the guilty innocent, and that’s power. Because they control the minds of the masses.” – Malcolm X

Many, if not most, Bermudians have had the opportunity to view the news footage from Baltimore, Maryland, involving the mysterious and curious death of Freddie Gray, which has sparked outrage worldwide.

Gray’s fatal encounter with officers came amid the national debate over the issue of the protracted use of force by the Police, particularly involving African-American citizens.

The Police have reported that Gray was arrested after making eye contact with officers and then running away. He was held down, handcuffed and loaded into a van without a seat belt. Cuffs were placed on his legs when he became irate.

Reports indicate that he asked for medical help several times before being put in the van; paramedics were not called until after a 30-minute ride. Police have acknowledged he should have received medical attention when he was arrested, but they have not said how his spine was injured.

Footage of buildings burning, officers wearing helmets and wielding shields, and damaged property were plastered on nearly every mainstream news station on television. People flooded Baltimore’s streets on Monday, torching a pharmacy, setting police cars ablaze and throwing bricks at officers hours after thousands mourned the man who died from a severe spinal injury he suffered in police custody.

The news reported that many of those on the streets appeared to be African-American youths. On every major station there was footage of young men and women on the streets; they were described as “terrorist”, “extremist”, “vigilantes”.

The killing of Gray, though garnering some media attention and the indisputable impetus for the explosion of frustration and angst — misguided and inappropriate as it may be, I will leave you to draw your own conclusions — did not receive the same level of media attention as Monday’s protest, which involved property being damaged.

This begs the question: do we value property more than we value lives in certain segments of the community? Why does the destruction of property get more outrage and media attention than the destruction of human life?

They are “destroying their own communities” some have said. I don’t understand why people think rioters are burning down their own communities. One reporter asked a lady on the scene why she was destroying her community. She responded: “Sir, what do you mean my community? We don’t own any of this!” There’s a difference between a “black community” and a community that black people reside in.

Some have said that the individuals partaking in such activities are “stupid”, “dumb” and “proving the plethora of stereotypes attributed to blacks to be right”.

We must be mindful that the media control the narrative. What they want us to see and hear they will show to us, what they don’t want us to see, we won’t. When events like this are plastered on every mainstream TV station 24/7 without acknowledgment of the etiology of the issue, one must seriously question the motive.

Is it to put black people against each other? Cast us in a negative light as “barbarian”, “animalistic” and out of control? There are a plethora of subliminal messages being sent by these reports but we must now allow it to make us feel embarrassed or ashamed of our people.

The riots are discussed on mainstream TV yet do not address the very root of the issues causing the unrest. The intent is questionable at best. I do not mourn broken windows. I mourn broken necks. I do not condone violence nor do I encourage it. Quite the contrary, I support peaceful means of resolution where effective.

But we cannot ignore the fact that African-American people all over are revolting. As a society we, including the mainstream media, must engage in dialogue to address the underlying issues to fix the problem.

• Kimani Gray, 16, New York: March 9, 2013;

• Deion Fludd, 17, New York: May 5, 2013;

• Yvette Smith, 47, Bastrop, Texas: February 16, 2014;

• Eric Garner, 43, New York: July 17, 2014;

• Jonathan Ferrell, 24, Bradfield Farms, NC: September 14, 2013;

• Freddie Gray, 25, Baltimore, April 19 2015.

Those are just a few of the unarmed African-American men and women who have been killed by Police over the past few years. This is no longer a rarity, but rather a sad and sickening epidemic and people have had enough.

“Some have enjoyed bringing up black-on-black crime when talking about the recent Police slayings. It’s understood that black-on-black crime is a problem. But when Eric kills Mike, Eric goes to jail for life. The issue is when officer Bob kills unarmed Eric, even with audio, video and 19 witnesses, Officer Bob goes home on paid administrative leave.” – author unknown.

After such tragic events, an unknown author penned this in response: “Until we are willing to really look at the violence African-Americans have been subjugated to for centuries, these forms of resistance will always appear as nonsensical violence. We must be careful not to treat a response to violence as the origin of it altogether.”

I end with a well-known quote from Fredrick Douglass. My hope is that we will understand and digest his words in hopes of fostering a dialogue with community leaders and stakeholders towards resolution to this tragic milieu.

“If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favour freedom and yet deprecate agitation are men who want crops without ploughing up the ground, they want rain without thunder and lightning.

“They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters. This struggle may be a moral one, or it may be a physical one, and it may be both moral and physical, but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.”

ERON HILL