3445 Reasons Why Michael Brown's Shooter Doesn't Get the Benefit of the Doubt.

When Michael Brown was executed in Missouri, the conservative response was to wait until the facts came out. Brown's shooter, they insist, deserves the benefit of the doubt.

Yet as I seriously ponder the issue of white privilege, a fact that disturbs me because it should not exist, yet sadly does, I reject the premise that Brown's shooter "deserves" the benefit of the doubt. He will get it of course, but because he is given the assurance of recognition of his rights. That is an assurance that was not given to Michael Brown.

It is an assurance that was not given to 73 black men, later proven innocent, who have faced the executioner. 57 whites, 12 Latinos, and 2 identified as "other" race shared that fate, but the majority of the exonerated were of minority race.

And it's an assurance that was not given to 3,445 men and women of African American descent who met their fate at the hands of lunch mobs that didn't care about their guilt or innocence. That's an average of one every 9 days in America...for 86 years!

That's 3445 reasons why we should insist that Michael Brown's executioner does not get special treatment. I am not calling for a lynch mob mentality, but I am calling for him to be brought to justice; justice he sadly denied Brown when he acted as judge, jury and executioner.

I know that as a parent I am statistically less likely than a father in Ferguson to find my child lying dead on the pavement. I am less likely to have to search the morgue because an overzealous night watchman who thought he was John Wayne targetted my child. I am less likely to find my child profiled for a crime they didn't commit.

I am angry because I was promised a vision where people were judged not by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. But everywhere I look, I see that I have been given benefits that are denied my brothers and sisters of color. And that infuriates me.

I don't want to benefit from white privilege. I want these families to enjoy the same safety and security that I do. I want to see equal treatment in the justice system and on the streets. And I want to see Michael Brown's murderer live a long life behind the bars of a federal prison for his callous disregard for that young man's life.

We cannot undo the sins of the past, but we can atone for them by focusing more intently on the sins of the present!