My Uncensored Thoughts on Ferguson Last night I was pulling up to my job that was scheduled when I was listening to the radio. They were happened to be broadcasting the finding of the Michael Brown Grand Jury. I had been thinking about this a lot over the last several months, listening to the News shows, reading about it on Facebook and I will admit to thinking that Officer Darren Wilson would be held accountable for his actions. After all, he shot and killed a black man who was unarmed. There were witnesses (both black and white) who claimed to have witnessed that the shooting was not justified (especially having put 12 bullets into him). But as time passed my expectations started to change. I observed stonewalling on the part of the prosecutor on “official” information about Officer Wilson’s actions. I also found myself becoming suspicious about the grand jury time-line and as the time-line increased so did my expectation that once again justice would elude a victim of color. I was able to listen to some of Bob McCulloch’s “presentation” when he let us know that there is no justice in Ferguson, Missouri. He went on and on about how the news media (and social media) did it’s best to cloud the truth of the events he “presented” to the Grand Jury. I will admit that I have not gone over a lot of the “evidence” that was presented to the grand jury, which I have not yet read through the conflicting testimony Mr. McCulloch presented. What hit me as strange was my understanding of what the job of the grand jury”: A grand jury is a legal body that is empowered to conduct official proceedings to investigate potential criminal conduct and to determine whether criminal charges should be brought. (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_jury) But from what Mr. McCulloch said it sounded to me like he tried the case (in order to find Darren Wilson innocent) in the Grand Jury. I always thought it was the job of the criminal trial to sort out the truth and the Grand Jury was to see if there was enough evidence for trial. Not being familiar with the system I guess there is plenty of room to either work to convict a person (by presenting the Grand Jury only with evidence to convict) or to pronounce a person “not guilty” (by presenting the Grand Jury with evidence and confusing testimony). All of this does nothing to convince the group of people who have been marginalized that the “In-Justice System” has anything positive to offer us. If anything it justifies the distrust (and fear) we have in the system and shows how corrupted this reality is, the reality for those of us of color. Just to illustrate how little faith people of color have with our “In-Justice System” the radio station I listen to quite a bit, WVON, has a daily listener poll, and today’s question is “Were you surprised by the Ferguson Grand Jury decision to not indict Officer Darren Wilson?” The result when I last checked is 16.2% YES and 83.2% NO. The powers-that-be tell us that justice is blind, and it is, it doesnt look when it makes decisions, it doesnt think when it makes decisions, and it makes decisions on race and nothing else. If you are a person of color you are 8 to 20 times more likely to get pulled over for driving in the “wrong” neighborhood. With stand your ground being black scares you so for that reason you can shoot us (we don’t even have to make a threatening move). But the worst part about all of this is that we are told that these actions are justified. That we must have done something to provoke the violence being heaped on us as a people, after all, look at all the people of color in prison (this is what I have personally read on some more “conservative” sites but I will not get into that now). From my view this has a great deal to do with perspective. Those who are of a fairer coloration do not share the same experiences of people of color. Your perspective is much more “sheltered” than ours. You have no understanding of racism. I have read (because not many will discuss this subject in person with a person of color out of fear I suppose). It is impossible to understand something you cannot experience. I have heard the argument that whites have experienced racism back when there were racial quotas but again that truly is not racism because racism is more than one thing. Experiencing racism is being looked at in fear because your skin is a different color. Experiencing racism is being confronted by a wall that stops you in everything you do when there is no reason to be stopped. Experiencing racism is the knowledge you have to be twice as good to be considered equal. Experiencing racism is having your history nullified. And finally, experiencing racism is not having the pain you suffer from racism acknowledged. I have seen a lot of articles on what White people can do in the wake of Ferguson, plans and calls for action but I see it as something much simpler. What I would like to see come out of this is for those of fairer color (after all, in truth there are no White or Black people, we all have color, just some are darker than others) is to acknowledge the pain those of us who are darker are faced with. This would be the best start to acknowledge and deal with the greater issues we have. (These are my thoughts and I have resisted editing them)
Posted on: Tue, 25 Nov 2014 21:56:56 +0000
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