Several nights ago, Ferguson, Missouri, erupted. It was a fiery and explosive demonstration of (out)rage.

It was also a fiery and explosive demonstration of hooliganism.

Unfortunately, hooliganism has an uncanny way of taking advantage of emotional situations (though issues far less significant than the death of a human being have been enough to incite riots around the world).

I’m not saying I at all agree with unrestrained vandalism, theft, and destruction. Because I don’t. But I am saying that, in the heat of the moment, it is so much easier to focus on the “flash bangs” than it is to sit back and carefully examine the layers of porous foundation that lead to such a “spectacular” and “immediate” display of fire and flames.

The truth is pressure against the injustices which limit, degrade, criminalize, and marginalize Black, Brown, multi-coloured, and impoverished communities has been building for so much longer than the last 100 days.

It has been building since the moment human beings created the structures to systemically, and violently, take away the rights, dignities, knowledges, and cultures from another set of human beings in order proclaim the superiority of their own values and beliefs. It has been building since these groups, through various forms of physical and structural violence, attempted to diminish the humanity of others in order to render them sub-human, property, Others.

Pressure has been building since those violent and systemic structures were established as “the norm”; since those violent and systemic structures became less public and more political; since those violent and systemic structures became so entrenched into society’s collective psyche that they became invisible—at least to those not directly confronted by those social constructs every day.

It has been building for so long, because people have been fighting back for so long. Because for just as long as people have attempted to dehumanize other people, people have resisted.

People have resisted, in the worst of conditions—slavery, war, indentured servitude, famine, genocide, poverty, racism—because people have always seen the value of human life.

In fact, people have seen the value of human life—of their own lives—no matter what derogatory abstractions are painted, or forced, upon them.

Ferguson erupted, not because one black-unarmed-cigarillo-stealing teenager was shot by a fearful-armed-white police officer.

Ferguson (and the world) erupted because the life and death of Michael Brown cracked the imperfect foundation on which most societies are created, exposing the long trapped resistance, anger, sadness, and rage that has pressed against coloured and marginalized communities for so long.

Pressure needs an outlet and pressure generates change.

I stood up for Michael Brown because the society in which I live systemically perpetuates a reality in which coloured and impoverished people do not have equal access to public systems which are supposed to be equal.

I stood up for Michael Brown because Black and Brown men are disproportionately more likely to be incarcerated or killed by the criminal justice system than other men.

I stood up from Michael Brown because kids and adults alike make mistakes, like stealing and doing drugs, and do not deserve to be perpetually demonized for it.

I stood up for Michael Brown because our own governments make much more significant mistakes and cause much more significant harm to many more people, and they too do not deserve to be perpetually demonized for it.

I stood up for Michael Brown because I believe there are real, tangible, and effective alternatives to lethal force.

I stood up for Michael Brown because no police officer is automatically not culpable, for anything, simply because he or she is a police officer.

I stood up for Michael Brown because I believe our criminal justice and governmental systems need to be held accountable for things that the public perceives to be unjust.

I stood up for Michael Brown because I believe in the incredibleness of human life; because I believe violence does not create meaningful and lasting change in any community; because I believe violence perpetuates violence.

I did not stand up for Michael Brown to ignorantly accuse a white police officer of a crime. I did not stand up for Michael Brown to universally denounce the integrity of all law enforcement officers and all members of the criminal justice system. I did not stand up for Michael Brown to hold another group of people accountable for all the ills of society.

But y’all, discrimination is real.

And discrimination—including racial discrimination—plays an active role in all aspects of society.

I can no longer hear the myth that minority communities are wholly responsible for the issues that are salient, and often endemic, within them. I can no longer hear the myth that racialization does not exist because “I don’t see colour” when the labels of white and Black are used extensively to describe people in this case and others. Because while race in the biological sense is a social construct, racialization—as in the categorization of others based on phenotypical characteristics and cultural stereotypes—is a social reality. (If it was not a social reality there would be no hyphenated citizenships [African American, Asian American, Hispanic American]; you would not think Asian, Black, White, Hispanic, Aboriginal; there would be no boxes to check.) I can no longer hear the myth that we all have equal access to the same systems because “we live in an equal and merit-based society”.

Because the cold, hard, statistical, factual, real truth is we don’t.

We don’t and it sucks. And I understand why people are so resistant to believing this truth. Because such a disheartening reality goes against the very soul of the American dream. Because it’s horrifying to imagine a system which excludes on the basis of variables for which one has no control.

But, across North America, people of certain groups (namely skin colours and economic groups) are disproportionately disenfranchised compared to other (namely white) groups. Even if you personally do not judge others on the basis of class, race, or gender, that does not mean society as a whole does not judge others. When people say we live in an unjust society, they are not pointing their fingers at you. They are acknowledging a truth, which we must all acknowledge, in order to collectively address the issue. Your own self-described ethical superiority is not a factor in the existence of (in)equality in society at large.

And, while there may be Black, Latino, Brown, Asian, and Aboriginal presidents, senators, lawyers, professors, and doctors, while there may be people of all shades in every department of every office, their exceptionalism is not evidence of equal access, of equal ability to succeed in this society. Their exceptionalism does not overwrite the systemic disenfranchisement of the masses. It is admirable and empowering, but nothing more.

In Canada and the U.S., if you are Black or Latino or Aboriginal, you are more likely to be paid less for the same position and education, than other members of society. You are more likely to live in poverty than other members of society. In Canada, Latinos make, on average, $7,500 less per year than other Canadians, despite having on average higher levels of education. In the U.S., 45 percent of Latinos make less than $20,000 per year. Poverty precipitates many problems in health care, education, and civic engagement. It prevents people from accessing many aspects of society.

Schools in low-income areas tend to be underfunded and under-resourced. Thus, although public education is free, not all schools are equal. If all schools are not equal, it follows that, not everyone has equal access to the same educational opportunities. (Watch The Lottery on Netflix if you haven’t.)

Without equal access to education, and without the financial means to pursue diverse avenues of education, options for many people are limited.

This is a reality.

It is also a reality that people of colour are disproportionately marginalized from the criminal justice system in the present. They were also disproportionately marginalized from the criminal justice system in the past. Police officers used to uphold laws which systemically excluded people from society. Police officers used to uphold laws which allowed people to be lynched and enslaved. Police officers used to uphold laws which barred people from dating one another on the basis of skin colour. Things are, fortunately, changing and have changed—but does it not make sense for there to be some level of trepidation towards law enforcement when there is a long-standing tradition of abusive behaviour from one group to another? If you have been burned many times by the same pot, would you keep touching it?

Not all police officers are bad. I am not even saying Darren Wilson is bad. But there is a legacy of police violence in all societies, because guns are deadly and people are fallible.

This is a reality.

Complicate all this with issues of racialization and demonization—with hundreds of years of systemic and institutionalized practices of racism and demonization.

This is reality.

I could go on, but I will stop here because I am exhausted.

Because as Jenee Desmond-Harris so poignantly articulated in The Root: “Here’s the thing: Each and every person...has access to the entire Internet, live feeds from Ferguson, materials on the entire history of American racism generally and violence against unarmed black men specifically. They are choosing to think the way they do because it works for them and makes them feel good.”

Michael Brown matters because all lives matter.

All. Lives. Matter.

Black lives matter.