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Arkansas Senator Stephanie Flowers Took Us To Glory With This Passionate Speech Against Stand Your Ground Laws

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Chamber of Arkansas State House of Representatives, Arkansas State Capitol, Little Rock, Arkansas, USA

Source: Danita Delimont / Getty

An Arkansas state senator gained national attention on Wednesday after her impassioned plea to vote down a “stand your ground bill,” went viral.

Senator Stephanie Flowers was first elected to the Arkansas House of Representatives in 2004, and then ran a successful campaign for a senate seat in 2011.

Stand Your Ground laws remain a hotbed topic since the shooting of Trayvon Martin, followed by several instances of state sanctioned violence against men and women of color.

Flowers’ powerful testimony may be clickbait for some, but her concerns are palpable as she asks her white counterparts to wake from their complacency. Flowers demands that her colleagues stipulate on the fact that racism is a deadly tool, not an imaginary concept during Wednesday’s Judiciary Committee meeting.

For over five minutes Flowers detailed her anxiety and pain as a the mother of a 27-year-old Black man. Her fears are palpable for Black parents across America who know the feeling all too well.

“I’ll be as quick as I can, as quick as it takes to kill somebody I guess. You want me to be that quick. … It doesn’t take much to look on the local news every night and see how many black kids, black boys, black men are being killed with these Stand Your Ground defenses that these people raise, and they get off,” she said.

“So I take issue with that. I’m the only person here of color. I am a mother, too. And I have a son. And I care as much for my son as y’all care for y’all’s. But my son doesn’t walk the same path as yours does. So this debate deserves more time.

I’m in Pine Bluff. We have killings regularly down there. … I don’t know where Mr. Ballinger is from. But I can tell you for a long time since I’ve been back here in Arkansas, I have feared for my son’s life. Now he’s 27 and he’s out of Arkansas, and I thank God he is when you’re bringing up crap like this. It offends me. And then to limit the debate, too? This is crazy.

You don’t have to worry about your children, Will [Sen. Will Bond]. I worry about my son. And I worry about other little black boys and girls.”

At this point she is asked to calm down by her colleague Sen. Alan Clarke.

“No I don’t,” Flowers responded. “What the hell you gonna do, shoot me?”

“Senator,” said Clark.

“Senator, s–t!,” she says in response.

Flowers also brought up the fact that some of the senators themselves walk around the state capitol with guns. She reportedly stormed out the session, but returned to vote on the measure.

The bill ultimately did not pass as the committee voted against it with a 4-3 vote, according to the Arkansas-Democrat Gazette.

You can watch the exchange above.


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