After a probably-too-extended absence from looking at news services (several months...yes, I do live in a cave! Why do you ask?), I'm struck by the number of stories circulating about racist white cops gunning down innocent black children. To read the news, it seems clear that every cop out there is a card-carrying KKK member who's engraved the names of your black babies on his bullets. "Black America has again been reminded that it's children are not seen as worthy of being alive," declares the opening line of an opinion piece in the Washington Times. There's the shooting of Michael Brown in Fergison, the shooting of an 18-year-old in St Louis, and now a 12-year-old boy in Ohio. It seems that white cops everywhere are guilty of genocide against black youth, right?
What seems to be missing in all of these is any discussion of the facts beyond the race and age of the "innocent victims" and that of the police officers who fired on them. It seems that those three pieces of information are really all that's needed, though. I mean surely that's all there is to the story, right? Black young person confronted with white cop equals racism, right? There's nothing more to it, is there? According to the court of public opinion, it would seem so.
Actually, there is, and I think it's high time we started to acknowledge it. White police officers are not out there cruising around looking for hapless black children to riddle with bullets. Each of these incidents have a complete set of facts that led to their outcomes, which are totally cast aside when we play the race card at the first opportunity.
Michael Brown was a thief with stolen goods clearly visible on his person when the officer confronted him. He fought with the (physically smaller) officer at his car door, breaking the driver's side window, bending in the rearview mirror, bruising the officer, and leaving his own DNA all over the officer's clothes, gun, and inside door handle (meaning that he grabbed all of these things during the struggle). A grand jury found that the physical evidence, including ballistic reports, verified the officer's report that he fired the fatal shot while Brown was charging headlong at him through a hail of bullets (evidence in brief, in full). Do these facts back up our popular opinion that Brown was an innocent little boy popped in the head by a racist officer in a drive-by shooting while the kid stood still with his hands raised in surrender shouting, "Pwease don't shoot me, Mistor Powice Officer!"? Um, no. He was a thief who had recently attacked a police officer in his patrol car, grappling with him with great force, and he was approaching the officer very rapidly when he died. If Brown had been white, green, or purple, the officer would have still have felt he had no choice but to shoot him. It's not racism, it's cops using guns to fight off criminals who like to fight hand-to-hand—and our media turns the cop into a villain and the criminal into an innocent victim just because the criminal happened to be black and the cop happened to be white. What if the cop Brown beat up and charged was black instead? What if Brown was white? Our opinions of the situation would be very different: we'd probably look a little closer at the facts.
The same is true for the other situations. The 18-year-old, whom the news agencies have reported to have been armed only with a sandwich, apparently fired three rounds at an off-duty cop from said "sandwich" which miraculously turned into a 9mm Ruger by the time police recovered it. The idea that it was a sandwich and not a weapon was sourced from a relative of the would-be cop-killer who was not anywhere near the scene (which somehow made it reliable testimony—same with the idea that Brown was surrendering at the time of his death, which comes from his friend and partner in crime who helped him rob a store earlier that night: reliable unbiased source, no?). Also of note is the fact that the young criminal was out on bail after being involed in a high-speed car chase with police a few months previous, which ended in a crash after which he was caught trying to dispose of a loaded .38 caliber pistol. Also, he was violating his bail, because a condition of it was that he was to remain in house arrest wearing an ankle monitor (he wasn't doing either when he tried to kill the off-duty cop). However, again, the media only cared that thearmed criminal violating his bail and shooting at people "innocent youth" was black and the policeman was white—cue the protests (which, for irony points, turned violent with protesters firing guns and damaging police cars, much as Ferguson riots burned black business-owners' shops—because of course this will teach those dirty white cops to casually gun down black kids!).
The 12-year-old in Ohio was armed with a BB-gun which was an extremely convincing replica of a semiautomatic pistol, from which the orange safety tip which distinguished it as a non-weapon had deliberately been removed. He was pointing this convincing weapon—deliberately made to appear more convincing—at people in a public park when an alarmed bystander called police. When the police showed up, the shots were fired when he went to draw the thing while standing ten feet away from officers who repeatedly told him not to. The officers then attempted to save his life by performing first aid on the scene. It's not a profile of racism, but a tragedy of irresponsibility and stupidity (probably on the part of a number of people: the caller voiced suspicions that the gun was not real, but this information evidently never made it to the officers—and who removed the safety tip that was specifically designed to prevent this kind of tragedy from occurring in the first place anyway?). But again, the media doesn't care that he disobeyed the police, gave them legitimate reason to fear for their lives, or was publicly wielding an overly-realistic gun-prop—we only care that the kid was black and the officer who fired on him was white: instant racism!
Let me propose something radical. Instead of automatically assuming racism whenever there's a confrontation between a white policeman and a black youth, let's look at the facts and see if things would have played out the same if both participants were of the same race. The Brown case and the case of the 18-year old gunman the Ruger would have been news footnotes in the crime sections if both participants were of the same race. If both participants in the shooting in Ohio were the same race, we'd probably be talking about safety and regulation of overly-realistic gun-toys or better information for cops or better fire-don't-fire training for them, rather than hurling accusations of bias. I suggest that, when we ignore the facts and paint the whole situation as dictated by racial color, we prove ourselves to be racist instead. Seriously, just because the cop is white, we can't see his perspective as valid or his actions as justified. Just because he is white we'd rather portray him as a rabid, fanatical racist rather than a reasonable human being reacting to what he perceives to be a life-threatening situation. Just because he is white we'd rather ignore his testimony, that of witnesses, that of our own justice system (painstakingly arrived at), and all the facts to take the word of criminals and their relatives who are biased against the officer or not even present at the scene. That's racism plain and simple, and that's what we're doing.
If we want the racism in our society to stop, we need to stop practicing it ourselves. We need to stop playing the race card at every turn and opportunity, step back, and take a look at the facts before we judge others and accuse them of cold-blooded, racially-charged murder.
What seems to be missing in all of these is any discussion of the facts beyond the race and age of the "innocent victims" and that of the police officers who fired on them. It seems that those three pieces of information are really all that's needed, though. I mean surely that's all there is to the story, right? Black young person confronted with white cop equals racism, right? There's nothing more to it, is there? According to the court of public opinion, it would seem so.
Actually, there is, and I think it's high time we started to acknowledge it. White police officers are not out there cruising around looking for hapless black children to riddle with bullets. Each of these incidents have a complete set of facts that led to their outcomes, which are totally cast aside when we play the race card at the first opportunity.
Michael Brown was a thief with stolen goods clearly visible on his person when the officer confronted him. He fought with the (physically smaller) officer at his car door, breaking the driver's side window, bending in the rearview mirror, bruising the officer, and leaving his own DNA all over the officer's clothes, gun, and inside door handle (meaning that he grabbed all of these things during the struggle). A grand jury found that the physical evidence, including ballistic reports, verified the officer's report that he fired the fatal shot while Brown was charging headlong at him through a hail of bullets (evidence in brief, in full). Do these facts back up our popular opinion that Brown was an innocent little boy popped in the head by a racist officer in a drive-by shooting while the kid stood still with his hands raised in surrender shouting, "Pwease don't shoot me, Mistor Powice Officer!"? Um, no. He was a thief who had recently attacked a police officer in his patrol car, grappling with him with great force, and he was approaching the officer very rapidly when he died. If Brown had been white, green, or purple, the officer would have still have felt he had no choice but to shoot him. It's not racism, it's cops using guns to fight off criminals who like to fight hand-to-hand—and our media turns the cop into a villain and the criminal into an innocent victim just because the criminal happened to be black and the cop happened to be white. What if the cop Brown beat up and charged was black instead? What if Brown was white? Our opinions of the situation would be very different: we'd probably look a little closer at the facts.
The same is true for the other situations. The 18-year-old, whom the news agencies have reported to have been armed only with a sandwich, apparently fired three rounds at an off-duty cop from said "sandwich" which miraculously turned into a 9mm Ruger by the time police recovered it. The idea that it was a sandwich and not a weapon was sourced from a relative of the would-be cop-killer who was not anywhere near the scene (which somehow made it reliable testimony—same with the idea that Brown was surrendering at the time of his death, which comes from his friend and partner in crime who helped him rob a store earlier that night: reliable unbiased source, no?). Also of note is the fact that the young criminal was out on bail after being involed in a high-speed car chase with police a few months previous, which ended in a crash after which he was caught trying to dispose of a loaded .38 caliber pistol. Also, he was violating his bail, because a condition of it was that he was to remain in house arrest wearing an ankle monitor (he wasn't doing either when he tried to kill the off-duty cop). However, again, the media only cared that the
The 12-year-old in Ohio was armed with a BB-gun which was an extremely convincing replica of a semiautomatic pistol, from which the orange safety tip which distinguished it as a non-weapon had deliberately been removed. He was pointing this convincing weapon—deliberately made to appear more convincing—at people in a public park when an alarmed bystander called police. When the police showed up, the shots were fired when he went to draw the thing while standing ten feet away from officers who repeatedly told him not to. The officers then attempted to save his life by performing first aid on the scene. It's not a profile of racism, but a tragedy of irresponsibility and stupidity (probably on the part of a number of people: the caller voiced suspicions that the gun was not real, but this information evidently never made it to the officers—and who removed the safety tip that was specifically designed to prevent this kind of tragedy from occurring in the first place anyway?). But again, the media doesn't care that he disobeyed the police, gave them legitimate reason to fear for their lives, or was publicly wielding an overly-realistic gun-prop—we only care that the kid was black and the officer who fired on him was white: instant racism!
Let me propose something radical. Instead of automatically assuming racism whenever there's a confrontation between a white policeman and a black youth, let's look at the facts and see if things would have played out the same if both participants were of the same race. The Brown case and the case of the 18-year old gunman the Ruger would have been news footnotes in the crime sections if both participants were of the same race. If both participants in the shooting in Ohio were the same race, we'd probably be talking about safety and regulation of overly-realistic gun-toys or better information for cops or better fire-don't-fire training for them, rather than hurling accusations of bias. I suggest that, when we ignore the facts and paint the whole situation as dictated by racial color, we prove ourselves to be racist instead. Seriously, just because the cop is white, we can't see his perspective as valid or his actions as justified. Just because he is white we'd rather portray him as a rabid, fanatical racist rather than a reasonable human being reacting to what he perceives to be a life-threatening situation. Just because he is white we'd rather ignore his testimony, that of witnesses, that of our own justice system (painstakingly arrived at), and all the facts to take the word of criminals and their relatives who are biased against the officer or not even present at the scene. That's racism plain and simple, and that's what we're doing.
If we want the racism in our society to stop, we need to stop practicing it ourselves. We need to stop playing the race card at every turn and opportunity, step back, and take a look at the facts before we judge others and accuse them of cold-blooded, racially-charged murder.
A few days after I posted this, I experienced it at the retailer where I work as a cashier. My check-reading machine was malfunctioning, a fact which I was unaware of until I attempted to use it. Unfortunately, as checks are somewhat uncommon, this was not until partway through my shift when two older women checked out in my line. The first woman attempted to pay with a check and the reader failed. After several unsuccessful attempts to fix it, I called over a supervisor who immediately processed the check for the customer at the next register over while I took care of her elderly friend, who was next in line. The one piece of information I've omitted so far: the woman who wrote the first check on that register happened to be black. Her friend behind her happened to be white. As I was making conversation with the white woman (as I had for her friend), she commented on the malfunction of the check reader and said, "I cannot believe the racism in this place." I was outraged and almost speechless. I made it clear as I could that the malfunction was legitimate and it wouldn't have run her checks any more than it ran her black friends, but the woman ignored me. In her mind, the moment a white cashier experienced a problem with a transaction involving a black customer, no legitimate reason need apply: the only possible explanation was racism.
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