Black Lives Matter: Disrupting the Nuclear Family?

While I do get into arguments and discussion on social media, mostly I blog in order to organize my own thoughts and to try to convince myself that my own opinions make sense. I'll often see people write things that I don't think are correct, but rather than automatically disagreeing, I'll do a little checking to see if the facts at least are correct. The opinion that people have of those facts is another matter, but you have to, at least in a sane world, start with the basic facts before you can form an opinion.

Something that I have seen a lot in the last week is an accusation that Black Lives Matter is a Marxist, anti-religion organization that is, in reality against Black people and seeks to disrupt the nuclear family. I first became aware of this position through the Facebook posts of someone I know through a mutual taste in music. I've traced her views back through several Black Christian preachers. I believe that they have arrived at their opinions by selective quoting, often out of context.

Many years ago I was part of a group that liked to think of themselves as a Biblical Research ministry. In retrospect they were nothing of the sort, but they did outline several things that one must understand when reading the Bible. One was that words must be understood in light of their meaning when they were written. This group used the King James Version of the Bible, which was originally published in 1611, with revisions made over the next hundred years. Many words no longer had the same meaning as they did 400 years ago. Other keys were to read things in their context, and of course, almost so obvious that it didn't need to be said" read what was written (not what you want to be written). All of this should be common sense when it comes to evaluating anything that we hear or read.

One of the "quotes" that has been repeated is the Black Lives Matter organization (BLM) is out to disrupt the nuclear family. What does that mean? Well, first of all, the complete quote, from the BLM website is:

“We disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure requirement by supporting each other as extended families and “villages” that collectively care for one another, especially our children, to the degree that mothers, parents, and children are comfortable."

So what does that mean? Some Christians would have you believe that it means to "drastically alter or destroy" the nuclear family. Indeed, if you look up the definition of "disrupt" the first definition that pops up will say just that. But does the statement on their website say that they want to "disrupt the nuclear family"? No, it says that they "disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure requirement...". Although it's not entirely clear just from looking at that phrase in isolation what precisely a Western-prescribed nuclear family structure requirement is, we can look at the context and get a clearer idea. We can determine what they mean by noting the word "by" - this clues us in on the "how" of the disruption: "by supporting each other as extended families and "villages" that collectively care for one another...". This doesn't sound like a negative interpretation of disruption (more on the modern positive definition of disruption in a moment), but harking back to a time when extended families and community were more the norm, even in American society, rather than what is the norm today, nuclear families that have isolated themselves from the greater community. Isn't that what churches espouse? The final clause "...especially our children, to the degree that mothers, parents, and children are comfortable." This hardly sounds like what some people are claiming that they're saying.

So what about an alternative meaning of "disrupt", one that frames disruptions as a good thing? Here's a link to an article on the Merriam-Webster website that discusses the changing meaning of "disrupt" and "disruption":
https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/the-new-meaning-of-disrupt?fbclid=IwAR3zVqLmCFr_93Fx4EhPL0rpj2Ra8nZs88ImB56fOPCgIFDdnSBqSWa6R4Q

With this relevant quote:
"...his theory of 'disruptive innovation' were using disrupt and its variant parts of speech in a fairly narrow sense, describing a process in which new business entities successfully challenge established ones by initially focusing attention on those areas of service which the older companies had overlooked, and leveraging this to a long term advantage."

I suggest that, based on the context, the BLM website is using "disrupt" in this way, or at least defining the word in a non-standard way, not, as some would suggest, to destroy the nuclear family.

The other issue that has been used as a pretext to disavow Black Lives Matter is the recent unearthing of a video where one of the organization's founders says "We are trained Marxists". Christian preachers and their followers, claiming that Marxism is an "anti-Christian religion", have declared that it would be un-Christian to support Black Loves Matter, sometimes conflating the organization of that name with the wider movement. There are several things wrong with that conclusion. Yes, it is true that Patrisse Cullors, one of the founders of the Black Lives Matter organization, has said, in response to a suggestion that the organization had no ideology, ""We actually do have an ideological frame. Myself and Alicia in particular, we're trained organizers. We are trained Marxists. We are super versed on ideological theories."

Again we have to go back to context. The sentence right before the "trained Marxists" statement is "...we're trained organizers". So what, precisely is Marxist about the organization? You'd be hard put to find anything unambiguously Marxist about their public statements. If the BLM organization is attempting to do anything beyond keeping young Black men from being indiscriminately shot and killed by the police and affecting systemic change to advance the equality of Blacks and other minorities, (one preacher referred to BLM's advocacy for LBGTQ people as a reason to shun them) they are doing a poor job of articulating it. So a couple of the people who were active early on in this movement and copyrighted a name and started a non-profit and put up a website claim expertise in organizing that they learned as Marxists. At least one socialist organization looks at them as sell-outs who aren't championing any socialist ideals.

https://www.socialistalternative.org/marxism-fight-black-freedom/black-lives-matter-marxism/

It's pretty evident that whatever Marxism was part of their ideology has faded away as the organization has become a movement, a movement composed of thousands of people who have no connection to an organization, but strong fealty to an idea, the idea, that despite all evidence to the contrary, Black lives matter.

Black Lives Matter is not a threat to Christians. Black Live Matter is not a threat to White people. Black Lives Matter is not a threat to the nuclear family. Black Lives Matter is a threat to racism, misogyny, bigotry, and anything that devalues one group of people.

Any organization, any movement, is going to have people with whom you disagree, who say unfortunate things, who make decisions at variance to their public stance. Should we anathematize the whole movement because we have found a few clay feet? Should we demonize all Christians because some Christian organizations have done evil?

If your only public statements regarding the Black Lives Matter movement are to conflate the organization with the movement and to find ways to tar both, I'd take a few moments to examine your motives.