Re-Post from The Root: MHP: No Country for Black Boys

Hopefully you have heard by now about yet another tragic loss of a young black man's life--a reportedly unarmed, Jordan Davis, 17, who was shot dead by a middle-aged white man, Michael Dunn, after words were exchanged at a Florida gas station, the day after Thanksgiving.  Even if we want to say, as Trayvon Martin's mother so graciously said, "this is not a black/white thing--it's a right/wrong thing...," I believe we have to heed university professor, author and MSNBC host, Melissa Harris-Perry's words and thoughts on how it seems way too easy for people to see young black men as potential threats, and oh, so difficult to see them as individual human beings.

Melissa Harris-Perry delivers her open letter to the American Public below:

MHP: No Country for Black Boys

When black teen Jordan Davis was shot the week of Thanksgiving by white man Michael Dunn, for many, memories of Trayvon Martin's death at the hands of George Zimmerman earlier this year came flooding back. On Saturday, MSNBC host Melissa Harris-Perry took this link further, back to Emmett Till, a young man from Chicago who was beaten and lynched for whistling at a white woman while visiting the Southern state of Mississippi in 1955. The parallels between these three cases are, as Harris-Perry highlights, that these young black men weren't seen as human beings but rather threats that needed to be conquered. And that's not an America anyone wants for young black boys.Watch Melissa Harris-Perry deliver her open letter to the American public:Watch more at MSNBC._______SOURCE:  www.theroot.comwww.msnbc.com