# Apparently saying "all lives matter" is racist according to a BLM's co-founder. **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [July 16, 2016, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083 "2016-07-16T23:16:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Idle\_Thoughts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/838e76/32.png) [@Idle\_Thoughts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idle_Thoughts)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2016, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/1 "2016-07-16T23:16:05Z")
[Story here.](http://endingthefed.com/black-lives-matter-co-founder-demands-white-folks-stop-saying-all-lives-matterits-racist.html) So I’m wondering what the posters here have to say about this…do you agree? Me, I understand and get that it’s been used to quash “black lives matter” discussion and protesting, but this sort of rubs me the wrong way. It just strikes me as being an extreme blanket statement where the person is overly generalizing something and grouping everyone and everything about it into the same boat. I agree with and support the BLM movement, but deep down, I have to say I do think all races should matter. If that apparently means I’m making racist comments now, then I guess I’m guilty. What about you? Do you think saying “all lives matter” is a racist thing to say? Yes or no? ---
**Author:** ![orcenio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/orcenio/32/1036_2.png) [@orcenio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/orcenio)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2016, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/2 "2016-07-16T23:35:21Z")
> [@Idle\_Thoughts](#): > > [Story here.](Story here.) Not really. ---
**Author:** ![Idle\_Thoughts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/838e76/32.png) [@Idle\_Thoughts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idle_Thoughts)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2016, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/3 "2016-07-16T23:37:31Z")
> [@orcenio](#): > > Not really. Fixed. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2016, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/4 "2016-07-16T23:37:39Z")
I’ll say it again: the phrase Black Lives Matter isn’t intended to mean that black lives matter more than other lives, but that black lives matter fully as much as other lives. It is used to counter the general cultural assumption (by some, obviously, not all) that black lives are, by nature, relatively cheap. So the question, for those who respond by saying that All Lives Matter, is whether they get the above context at all. My guess is that they do and that they don’t like the message much. That means that yes, most of the time the motives (however deeply buried they might be) are racist. I don’t think, however, that it helps anything at all to say that all utterances of All Lives Matter are racist. “Racist” is an easy epithet, and no matter how often it might be true, it’s very hard to prove to anyone who isn’t ready to admit that it’s true. There is a lot of built-in resistance to the term. In other words, it is pointlessly inflammatory. Finally, while I think I understand what motivates the Black Lives Matter movement, I think it is an ill-judged phrase. I don’t have an alternative, especially not one that as snappy, but I have always responded much better to precision and carefulness in English expression than to sloppy snappiness. Yes, I would have made a lousy advertising slogan-monger. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2016, 11:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/5 "2016-07-16T23:38:58Z")
How many times are we going to keep talking about this? ---
**Author:** ![bobot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bobot/32/21622_2.png) [@bobot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bobot)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2016, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/6 "2016-07-16T23:43:06Z")
Of course all lives matter. But generally when someone says it, it is an attempt to negate another phrase, Black Lives Matter. ---
**Author:** ![Rysto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ecccb3/32.png) [@Rysto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rysto)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2016, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/7 "2016-07-16T23:50:04Z")
> [@Idle\_Thoughts](#): > > What about you? Do you think saying “all lives matter” is a racist thing to say? Yes or no? Context is important. As a general statement, there’s nothing wrong with saying “all lives matter”. As a response to the Black Lives Matters movement, it’s problematic for a number of reasons: 1. It ascribes a meaning to “Black Lives Matters” that was absolutely not intended. “Black Lives Matter” is not saying that only black lives matter, and implying that is the movement’s intent frankly looks to me like an attempt to disparage their motives through semantic games rather than trying to address the real issues. 2. One of the primary complaints that Black Lives Matters is raising is that the black community is facing a number of issues that other communities don’t. So when one strips “Black” out of the slogan “Black Lives Matters”, they’re explicitly denying that there are unique issues faced by the black community. This is especially offensive as it nearly invariably is done by a white male. If it were coming from a hispanic who was trying to make the point that hispanics face a similar set of issues, it’d be one thing, but when it comes from a white male it’s rather offensive. ---
**Author:** ![Cazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cazzle/32/75_2.png) [@Cazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cazzle)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2016, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/8 "2016-07-16T23:52:26Z")
“Racist” seems like an overstatement… and yet, “All Lives Matter” seems to be an acceptance of the status quo, where black lives are routinely treated as though they don’t matter. ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2016, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/9 "2016-07-16T23:55:51Z")
Here’s a useful way to think about it, paraphrased from something i read a few days ago: A large group of people is sitting down to dinner. The food is served onto plates and handed to each person in turn. Everyone at the table gets a meal, except for Dennis, who sits there with an empty plate. Dennis looks around him at all the people eating, and says “I should get some food.” Someone else looks up and says, “_Everyone_ should get some food.” And then they all just keep eating, and no-one passes Dennis any food. That’s pretty much the attitude behind a lot of the “All Lives Matter” people. It’s an effort to downplay or minimize or erase altogether the historic racial inequalities evident in America’s law enforcement and criminal justice system. ---
**Author:** ![orcenio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/orcenio/32/1036_2.png) [@orcenio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/orcenio)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2016, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/10 "2016-07-16T23:59:24Z")
I kinda preferred **Budget Player Cadet** version. > [@Are the actions of BLM wise or foolish?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-actions-of-blm-wise-or-foolish/738278/35): > > “All lives matters” is a complete dismissal of the point. > > Imagine that you go out to dinner with your family, and everyone gets what they order except you - you get a plate full of dicks. You say, “Hey, I should get what I ordered!” And your wife responds with “_Everyone_ should get what they ordered,” while chowing down on the food she ordered and doing absolutely nothing about your plate of dicks. The effective meaning of that sentence is to _completely ignore your complaints_. Yes, obviously everyone should get what they ordered, but _most people already do_. ---
**Author:** ![Morgenstern](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Morgenstern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morgenstern)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2016, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/11 "2016-07-17T00:00:45Z")
Dennis is a diabetic and shouldn’t have spaghetti? ---
**Author:** ![raventhief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/raventhief/32/4_2.png) [@raventhief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/raventhief)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2016, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/12 "2016-07-17T00:06:03Z")
A Reddit “Explain it to me like I’m 5” thread explained it thus: [\*Imagine that you’re sitting down to dinner with your family, and while everyone else gets a serving of the meal, you don’t get any. So you say “I should get my fair share.” And as a direct response to this, your dad corrects you, saying, “everyone should get their fair share.” Now, that’s a wonderful sentiment — indeed, everyone should, and that was kinda your point in the first place: that you should be a part of everyone, and you should get your fair share also. However, dad’s smart-ass comment just dismissed you and didn’t solve the problem that you still haven’t gotten any! The problem is that the statement “I should get my fair share” had an implicit “too” at the end: “I should get my fair share, too, just like everyone else.” But your dad’s response treated your statement as though you meant “only I should get my fair share”, which clearly was not your intention. As a result, his statement that “everyone should get their fair share,” while true, only served to ignore the problem you were trying to point out.\*]([http://fusion.net/story/170591/the-next-time-someone-says-all-lives-matter-show-them-these-5-paragraphs/](http://fusion.net/story/170591/the-next-time-someone-says-all-lives-matter-show-them-these-5-paragraphs/)) There’s more, but now whenever I hear someone saying All Lives Matter, I picture a smart ass dad saying “Everyone should get their fair share” and still not giving the hungry kid any dinner. Ninja’d - damnit! Clearly I should have refreshed the page before hitting submit. ---
**Author:** ![VinylTurnip](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b2d939/32.png) [@VinylTurnip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VinylTurnip)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2016, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/13 "2016-07-17T00:13:02Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > How many times are we going to keep talking about this? Yeah. _All_ topics matter. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2016, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/14 "2016-07-17T00:15:52Z")
If someone says “All lives matter” instead of assuming they are racist the response is to explain that black lives haven’t mattered as much they should and the cause is focusing on that. “All lives matter” is not racist, assuming so is the sign of a closed mind. This could have been avoided with a better slogan. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2016, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/15 "2016-07-17T00:34:00Z")
> [@mhendo](#): > > Here’s a useful way to think about it, paraphrased from something i read a few days ago: > > A large group of people is sitting down to dinner. The food is served onto plates and handed to each person in turn. Everyone at the table gets a meal, except for Dennis, who sits there with an empty plate. > > Dennis looks around him at all the people eating, and says “I should get some food.” > > Someone else looks up and says, “_Everyone_ should get some food.” And then they all just keep eating, and no-one passes Dennis any food. But it’s the last sentence that’s doing all the work! If someone said “_Everyone_ should get some food,” and then handed Dennis some food, it’d be unobjectionable. If someone said “Yeah, you should get some food,” and went back to chowing down, that’d be objectionable. Either phrase would be fine if paired with the appropriate action – and either phrase would be worthless if disregarded! ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2016, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/16 "2016-07-17T00:35:01Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > If someone says “All lives matter” instead of assuming they are racist the response is to explain that black lives haven’t mattered as much they should and the cause is focusing on that. “All lives matter” is not racist, assuming so is the sign of a closed mind. This could have been avoided with a better slogan. My first assumption tends to be not that the person is necessarily racist, but that they are an ignoramus. If you are living in the United States, have any understanding at all of the country’s history, and have followed even casually the way that African Americans are treated by law enforcement and the criminal justice system, the point of saying “Black Lives Matter” should be as clear as crystal. I concede that some people are probably ignorant enough that they need some of this explained to them. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2016, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/17 "2016-07-17T00:53:55Z")
“My house is on fire! Call the fire department!” “[All houses matter](http://chainsawsuit.com/comic/2014/12/08/all-things-considered/), not just yours.” ---
**Author:** ![Jophiel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jophiel/32/66_2.png) [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2016, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/18 "2016-07-17T00:57:58Z")
“All lives matter” is often used to trivialize or dismiss the BLM movement. So, yeah, I can see someone being upset or insulted by its use. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2016, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/19 "2016-07-17T01:00:06Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > “My house is on fire! Call the fire department!” > > “[All houses matter](http://chainsawsuit.com/comic/2014/12/08/all-things-considered/), not just yours.” Again, if someone calls the fire department to put of the blaze at my house because they believe that All Houses Matter, then they’re A-OK in my book – but if they _don’t_ call the fire department, then saying My House Matters does me no good. Wouldn’t either reply be fine if paired with the right action, and pointless if paired with the wrong action? ---
**Author:** ![Max\_the\_Immortal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/6de8d8/32.png) [@Max\_the\_Immortal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_the_Immortal)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2016, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083/20 "2016-07-17T01:00:35Z")
In hindsight, maybe Black Lives Matter should have called themselves All Lives Matter. (As in: All lives matter, and and we need to stop behaving as though black lives don’t.) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apparently-saying-all-lives-matter-is-racist-according-to-a-blms-co-founder/760083.md?page=2)