re: So one of the guys behind #blacklivesmatter is really white?

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He and I met collaborating on a relief project after the Haitian earthquake. I was faculty at a metro-Atlanta college and his church was in the city - Shaun organized, very quickly, a program to fly tents and other shelters to Haiti. It was a very successful campaign and one I was proud to be a part of. So, I've known him for five years, mostly in a professional capacity, though I did attend his church a few times as part of that work. I've met his wife and children. I've met many of the people around him. If it turns out he was "passing", it will really shock me. Though, after the whole Rachel Doezel business, I guess nothing is shocking in that regard anymore.

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Shaun King, my great friend of over 30 years, is under severe attack today. He is currently the number one trending topic in the world and everything his attackers are saying is a stone cold lie.

I've known Shaun since I was in the third grade. We both grew up in Versailles, KY. We both graduated from Woodford County High School. We were roommates while attending Morehouse College in Atlanta, GA and we remain close friends to this day. Not only was Shaun beaten to a bloody pulp by a mob of students while we were in high school, my city of Versailles did everything it could to cover up and down play the event from the moment that it happened, as evidenced by half-assed police report and lack of news coverage at the time of the event.
All of this happened during a time where racial tensions were at extreme levels.
A student at my high school has recently shared his eye witness account and first hand perspective as a white student that grew up in my hometown of Versailles.

To anybody from my city of Versailles that comes across this story, we should be MORE than vocal about it. During my time in high school, Versailles dropped the ball on how it handled EVERY instance of racial tension.

And to question his race? Since the third grade, Shaun has had to deal with whispers as to his racial make-up. Whispers that no adult helped him deal with or process. Yes, that includes his mother.

Shaun got called "****" just as much, if not more, than myself or any of my black friends and family while growing up in Versailles. Do you think an 8 year old would volunteer for that type of treatment? A funny colored, wavy haired child just trying to navigate life? To have anything from racial slurs to cups full of dip-spit (chewing tobacco) hurled at you from confederate flag covered pick-up trucks? And then 20 years later have some right wing assholes question whether it ever happened and go as far as to call you a fraud and try to de-bunk years of social justice work that you've put under your belt?

We grew up in a town where white mothers were constantly dis-owned by their families for having relationships and making children with black fathers. Where even into the 2000's, the racial identities of mix-raced children were a taboo topic. Shaun was a direct victim of that. 20 years later, much progress has been made in my town of Versailles, but we are proving we have much further to go if people from my home town don't speak the frick up.

With all the blatant instances of racism still happening in 2015, imagine what it was like 20 years ago in a rural Kentucky town with a population of less than 8,000. Imagine how a high school and police department would handle a potential "hate crime".

If this happened in the age of the internet, the story would have spread like wildfire, but 20 years ago, the systematic conditions were in place to sweep Shaun and his situation under the rug.

During those 20 months that Shaun spent time recovering, I was a constant presence at his bedside. Directly following the altercation and many more times over the years, Shaun had numerous spinal surgeries and is still in pain EVERY DAY OF HIS LIFE.

He's told his story countless times, but rarely comments on the amount of pain that he is in on a DAILY.

The extent that news media will go to in order to discredit a soldier that's dedicated his life to fighting injustice sickens me.

If anything, his entire life of dealing with this mess is the REASON he fights for injustice. Why are these idiots too blind to see that?

Piss off,

Willis Polk II pka Deacon (of CunninLynguists)

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They've been around for like 15 years. One of the better underground Atlanta Hip-Hop groups ...

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Curious, if Shaun is proven to actually be white and his story false, how do you think the black community will respond?

Remember how the black community disowned Rachel Dolezal? Will Shaun experience the same thing?

Do you think transracialism will become the new civil rights movement?

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RE: his birth certificate, I haven't seen anything where the purported white father signed his name. Could be that Shaun's mother listed her husband as Shaun's father even though he wasn't. All we see is what was filed with the state of Kentucky, not the hospital certificate with the finger prints, signatures, etc. That document isn't as concrete as folks make it out.

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