Raymond Chaluisant, Youth with Toy Water Gun, Murdered by a Cop in the Bronx

Another cop murdered another Black youth last week (at least one— of whom we’re aware). On July 21st, eighteen-year-old Raymond Chaluisant was shooting water pistols with his friends in the Bronx when he was murdered by an off-duty cop.

Last week— that of July 18th, 2022— stands among the hottest weekends on record in New York City, with temperatures soaring to the mid-nineties and the “real feel” at times surpassing 100. Kids everywhere opened hydrants, shot water pistols, and launched water balloons in an effort to stay cool. These summer rituals are not only essential to the health and safety of anyone whose apartment does not have an air conditioner but also just plain fun to which any young person is entitled.

The murderer was an off-duty corrections officer who trains other officers at a shooting range and went to work the morning after he killed Raymond as though nothing had happened. Despicable state thugs went so far as to tweet shortly after Raymond’s murder that the specific type of toy gun he’d been using is “a violation in NYC.” In short, they blamed him— without even saying his name.

Such audacity speaks volumes of the white-supremacist hellscape in which we find ourselves.

The question becomes: Can Hell itself burn?

This violence is pervading every city, every county. Just two months ago, a white supremacist murdered ten people at a grocery store in Buffalo, NY. Despite the heat of the moment, the assassin survived his encounter with police. The entire massacre was live-streamed.

Is there any reason to believe this will all just stop happening? That white supremacists will either get bored or grow hearts and leave the rest of us alone?

The truth is, they will not stop until they are met with rebellion.

History has repeatedly borne this out; white supremacist violence does not relent until forced to do so— until its operations are rendered impossible, its institutions and authority made untenable.*

We cannot afford to become desensitized in the face of onslaught after onslaught of white supremacist violence.

We must prepare to defend ourselves, each other, and our communities with all that we have and all that we are.

*The work of Robert F. Williams and others in Monroe, North Carolina in the late ‘50s and early ‘60s provides one of many strong examples. To learn more about this, check out the book/film Negroes with Guns. 

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