Woman notices unnerving similarity between stories behind lynchings and contemporary police brutality

A Twitter user has noticed an eerie similarity between the stories of black people who were lynched, and those of police brutality towards the African American community in the United States today.

Naima Cocheran, @Naima on Twitter, decided to take a detour on her way home from a trip so that they could stop in on the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, otherwise known as the Montgomery lynching memorial in Alabama.

She then went on to explain how some of the reasons given for the black people who lost their lives to lynchings, sounded very familiar to the way black people lose their lives at the hands of police brutality today.

She wrote:

The latest dates I saw were in the 1940’s. As late as 47.

Some lynched for something as simple as standing around a white space, 'frightening' a white woman.

Sh*t is sounding way too familiar right now.

Some examples of the reasons for the lynchings are painfully familiar:

A black man way lynched in Millersberg, Ohio, in 1892, for 'standing around' in a white neighbourhood.

Another reads:

William Wardley was lynched in Ironside, Alabama, in 1896 because local merchants wrongly thought his money was counterfeit.

And a third:

Jesse Thornton was lynched in Luverne, Alabama, in 1940 for addressing a white police officer without the title 'mister'

She continued with a follow up tweet, saying:

These stories rise up in our spirit every time a black person is killed extrajudicially at the hands of police officers...

She then argues that every time a white person calls the police on a black person, simply because they think the colour of their skin is suspicious, the stories of those who were lynched rise up to the forefront again.

Finally, she includes more information about the memorial in Alabama.

Many Twitter users were highly moved by the posts, with some apologising for their white race's behaviour.

In recent months, there have been a succession of instances of white people calling the police on black people, simply for existing and going about their day-to-day lives.

In May, a white woman called the police on a black family for having a barbecue by a lake in Orlando in the correct designated area; last week a neighbour called the police on a 12-year-old African American boy for mowing their lawn; and earlier today it was reported that a woman called the police on a 12-year-old African American boy because she thought that he looked 'suspicious' while out on his paper round.

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