Bradley Beal has been with the Washington Wizards since 2012. He has emerged as a two-time all-star and a center-piece with the Washington Wizards alongside his back-court teammate John Wall, whom is presently recovering from an injury. He currently is the number 2 scorer in the NBA. He spoke out saying that what happened to him happened simply because he was driving a fancy car (implied that it was because he was black).
The New York Times, in their daily podcast, has had a series of stories from people about why they protest, and they sometimes have experiences that either happened to them personally, or, a friend, where they’ve been involved with police and something seemed a little funny to them— only in this case, it has to do with an NBA star, in Bradley Beal. The New York Times has done previous reporting about why police people sometimes stay in power long after they have an incident, detailing some of the power obstacles that reformers face when trying to advocate for change.
Nobody is saying that the police have an easy job, but, people are finding that some of the things that are meant to help ensure that police are treated fairly in a disciplinary action, have resulted in letting officers back in when they’ve done disciplinary actions in the first place which people have complained about. The New York Times also did a podcast about the the Lafayette Square incident with Trump as well, detailing some of the frustration, which seems to be echoed by Bradley Beal here. It should be noted that the ACLU of Washington D.C. did a study where the Wizards play and they found that blacks were disproportionately stopped by the officers of their Metropolitan Police Department.
Bradley Beal was joined by a Washington Mystics WNBA player, Natasha Cloud, (it should be noted that the Mystics won the title in 2019). The two teams coordinated together to make sure that the rally was possible.
“The last few weeks have been a mix of emotions ranging from sadness to that daily fear that we face with being black in America to anger,” stated Cloud, who has been a leader off the court with activism in the WNBA, “We’re using our platforms, making sure we’re using our voices. This is where we stand united togehter in solidarity, to say we’re not going to be silent anymore.”
Bradley Beal said that seeing MIchael Brown killed in his own hometown and not doing anything about it really changed him. It should be noted that that route 495 of the free way runs through DC and Prince Georgia’s County, which have had problematic allegations which raise from whether they mistreat people who are minority groups unfairly, to sexual assault.
If you enjoy the articles that The Washington Ledger provides you, please consider leaving a small donation. Your support helps keep the lights on and allows us to hire more writers and pay our current writers.
 |  |  |
The Washington Ledger 