Ben Carson Criticizes Black Lives Matter Strategy, Focus; Says Movement Ignoring Homicide by Young Black Males
Republican presidential candidate Dr. Ben Carson on Sunday criticized the Black Lives Matter movement, saying they are politicizing issues and using disruptive methods while overlooking some critical issues like homicide by young black males.
"I would like them to start paying attention to the carnage rather than making it a political issue," Carson, the only African-American presidential candidate in the 2016 field, told told Fox News.
"The most common cause of death for young black males in cities is homicide," added Carson, a retired neurosurgeon.
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Black Lives Matter protesters have disrupted several campaign events of presidential candidates, both Republican and Democrat.
Carson recently appeared to call the movement, which mainly seeks to highlight police brutality against African-Americans, "so silly." "Of course all lives matter. I don't want to get into it, it's so silly," he said at a rally in late July.
However, earlier this month, Carson explained while speaking on NBC's "Meet the Press" that he didn't mean to say that the movement is silly.
"Of course all lives matter," Carson said. "What I called silly is political correctness going amok. That's what's silly. Of course we should be very concerned about what's going on, particularly in our inner cities."
He added: "It's a crime, you know, for a young black man, the most likely cause of death is homicide. That is a huge problem that we need to address in a very serious way. The vast majority of police are very good people. Are there bad apples? Of course. But if you hire a plumber and he does a bad job, do you say all plumbers are bad? Let's go out and kill them? I don't think we do that."
There's a need for people to be "a little more mature," he went on to say, and added, "but certainly in cases where police are doing things that are inappropriate, I think we ought to investigate those promptly and justice should be swift."
Black Lives Matter started in 2012 after George Zimmerman was acquitted in the death of Trayvon Martin, and "dead 17-year-old Trayvon was post-humously placed on trial for his own murder," according to the movement's website.
The grassroots activist movement says it is working "for a world where Black lives are no longer systematically and intentionally targeted for demise."
