For some reason, when people hear “Black Lives Matter” they’re immediately stricken with fear. They act as though this group is dangerous and scary, clearly ignoring the fact that their mission statement seeks to create a future where black people aren’t targeted unjustly by the police. However, it seems this goal is even further out of reach because people are overwhelmingly afraid of changing the status quo.

The FBI declared that a major domestic threat to the United States is “black identity extremism.” According to Michael German, former FBI agent, “Basically, it’s black people who scare them.”

The deaths of Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown are cited as the key cases that started Black Lives Matter. The FBI states that the death of Michael Brown was a catalyst for Black Identity Extremism (BIE).

This isn’t the first time the FBI has had a mild heart attack over black people demanding to be treated like human beings. It goes back to the Civil Rights movement of the 60s when the FBI targeted various black activists including members of the NAACP, members of the Black Panthers and even Martin Luther King Jr. himself. The FBI kept MLK under perpetual surveillance, actively harassing him and his wife. His house and his hotel rooms were wiretapped; the FBI listened constantly for anything that could take him down since he was considered the “most dangerous and effective Negro leader in the country.”

People are now worried about Black Lives Matter protesters committing crimes of BIE. Yet, while they’re distracted with black people demanding humanity, there are very real threats to the safety of American citizens, and they aren’t black extremists.

I would, firstly, suggest taking a look at Washington Post’s “The Math of Mass Shootings” to get a better perspective on what I’m talking about, but I’ll do my best in this limited space to illustrate my point.

Threats to American lives are not in the form of black people so much as they are of men. Basically the group of people who are allotted the most privilege in our nation and in most others, and are the most prone to mass deadly action.

The majority of rapes, assaults, domestic violence and abuse are perpetrated by men. Google is out there with the statistics if you’re so inclined. But a conversation about male violence would result in an upheaval of a large part of American culture. We would have to take into consideration what makes these individuals so prone to violence, what impact our policies and dialogues have on this violence, reconsider where we are as a nation and our national identity, etc.

Instead, it’s easier to simply use the negative feelings towards black activists and twist it away from a productive conversation. There are people out there who have to march to gain their rights and yet our government would condemn them. It speaks volumes about how we view the rights of marginalized groups, especially when they have the gall to stand up for them. Land of the free, indeed.