During a preliminary hearing Thursday, a Clay County, Mo. judge ruled that Andrew Lester, a White man, will stand trial for shooting Ralph Yarl, a Black teen who mistakenly rang the doorbell at Lester’s home.
Lester, who is charged with first-degree felony assault and felony armed criminal action, entered a not-guilty plea. He's scheduled to be arraigned Sept. 20.
As an alarming number of stories and videos surface of unarmed Black men being murdered by "terrified" White people, you have to wonder what is it about Black men that seem so threatening. Going back generations, Black men have been falsely associated with criminal and social wrongdoings. These ideas are perpetuated in pop culture and echoed throughout White America — the case of Ralph Yarl is another tragic cry for deep systemic change.
If you're listening to the gloomy outlook peddled by woke culture warriors, you might not know that race relations in America have actually improved. Transcending race is actually championed by conservatives, but leftist identity politics regurgitate stale narratives about xenophobes, sexists, and racists leading the charge. This divisiveness is harming America's social fabric.