The illogic of bigotry has always tainted and diminished all societies throughout world history. Whether that prejudice was directed against the Jewish people, those who descended from the continent of Africa, or the Irish, an entire group was stereotyped by the powers that be in a given society as inferior and dispensable.

A margin of injustice exits in all of the 195 United Nations recognized countries of the world to one degree or another. The majority of one heritage may have a natural affinity for others like themselves. However, that preference does not have to be exclusionary of other types of people.

In our United States, one hopes we have evolved to a point where the amount of discrimination has been significantly reduced, especially since the inception of the Great Society programs of the 1960s. Yet in recent years, the ugly apparition of bigotry has apparently reappeared. Whether that ghost is real or imagined is the challenging question.

The great melting pot that our nation is supposed to be sometimes has not congealed recently in the fashion that most citizens would desire. The recipe for society becomes a perfect mixture is when all the ingredients bind together, but when they separate in the pot and do not blend as an American dish, the taste is bitter.

The 26th president of the United States, Theodore Roosevelt, railed against hyphenated Americans. He stated that hyphenated Americans by their self-identification promoted divisiveness in our society. “African-Americans” are simply Americans and the constant hyphenated identification is divisive in and of itself.

By segmenting certain citizens in the saying “Black Lives Matter” to the exclusion of all other American lives, we are legitimizing a permanent wall of division between African Americans and everyone else. In fact, obviously every citizen’s life is as important as every other citizen’s life.

Have recent events demonstrated a resurgence of prejudice in our society, or is there an industry of societal divisiveness that benefits those who exacerbate disruption? What conclusion can we draw from the occurrences that have promulgated the creation of the Black Lives Matter movement? Where there violations of the guarantees of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution? Moreover, were the Citizenship Clause, the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause respected and upheld in recent provocative incidents involving police and black people? Do our fellow citizens of color necessarily have to point out that their lives matter as much as the rest of us?

In every wave of immigrants throughout American history, newcomers have faced difficulties in assimilation. In the mid-1800s, the Irish fled starvation and indentured servitude in the United Kingdom and flooded into North America. Consequently, they were ostracized and held universally culpable for virtually all crimes committed. They were called “Celtic Brutes,” “Papists,” and “Never Do Wells.” Even the Providence Journal, and an organization of upper-class power brokers called the “Journal Ring,” had printed propaganda almost daily intended to degrade and devalue the Irish immigrants. The Journal’s constant depiction of the Irish as dangerous, along with the carping, complaining, and challenging of Irish people taking up residence here, created a foreboding atmosphere that resulted in erroneous arrests.

Similarly, police brutality and excessive force was commonplace against the Irish, along with many convictions that were outright miscarriages of justice.

Fifty years later, when Eastern Europeans of Jewish heritage immigrated to America, they were also used as scapegoats and falsely accused of all sorts of crimes.

The Irish and the Jews were guilty of “otherness.” Simply, their cultural differences caused their initial alienation. Eventually, over time these two ethnic groups assimilated into America’s melting pot, as did many other waves of newcomers. But the journey of African Americans was markedly different. Black Lives Matter believes their current treatment is similar to the Irish and Jews of old.

Due to the heinous institution of slavery, African Americans emerged from the status of property to their righteous place as fellow human beings and citizens after the Emancipation Proclamation and the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States in the 1860s. However, the legacy of bigotry still shamefully flourished in our country for another century with “Jim Crow” laws and perverse sentences carried out at the end of a branch. Black Americans did not enjoy fair justice, proper police interaction, and equivalent status to other Americans. In that era, African Americans were racially profiled, and miscarriages of justice were not uncommon. Blacks were considered in a state of “otherness.”

However, after the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s, the Great Society programs and the Civil Rights Act became the pivot point in eroding society’s institutional bigotry. Now, 50 years later, we must ask ourselves whether prejudice has abated to the extent where claims of unfair and uneven treatment under the law are being embellished by those who benefit from an industry of societal divisiveness. Thus, are black Americans targeted injudiciously today, and who gains by sustaining the societal turmoil?

Is not the evidence of the many African American success stories of the past five decades proof of equivalence? We have many lawyers, judges, doctors, and for that matter a president who are of color.

Certainly, the application of deadly force by a police officer is a judgment call that is made in the blink of an eye. If the officer hesitates, he or she could be lying dead in the street. Simultaneously, a suspect’s life could be extinguished without cause if situations are misinterpreted. These circumstances are fragile and often opaque.

The Black Lives Matter website states that African Americans are being unfairly targeted and that law enforcement devalues black Americans. People, regardless of heritage, who are involved in criminality render themselves in a place of potential interaction with the police. The question is, are blacks being perceived with a presumption of guilt and deemed culpable for society’s ills still today in the same manner as the Irish and the Jews of long ago?

Activists who have made their livelihood on racial strife such as the Rev. Al Sharpton and the Rev. Jesse Jackson assert that this state of injustice does in fact currently exist. In the last 18 months, galvanizing incidents like the fatal shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., in August 2014, the fatal shooting of Vonderrit Meyers in St. Louis, Mo., in October 2014, and the in-custody death of suspect Freddie Gray in Baltimore, Md., in April 2015 have propelled riots and provoked a seemingly intractable divisive stance by activists groups.

Unfortunately, the very statement Black Lives Matter promotes disunity on its face. Of course, our African American fellow citizens’ lives matter. Every American’s life is greatly valuable, for we are all part of the American family.

Furthermore, if law enforcement is demonized as enemies of justice in regard to black Americans, then they are being unfairly assailed in the same fashion that African Americans were prior to the Great Society. Let us break the bonds of erroneous presumption. Not every police officer is an over-reaching bully, and not every African American is guilty of something.

The elegant words of civil rights leader Dr. Martin King in 1963’s “I Have a Dream” speech should guide all parties here: “…will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.”

Perhaps we should paraphrase and add no one should be judged by their profession as well, even if they wear a badge.