Please take the time to read and think about the following post from Jesse Irwin: No matter if Mike Brown was a horned devil and this cop was a hero, no matter if the kid was an angel and Darren Wilson gunned him down, people need to be out in the street right now. Our whole justice system is a mess and we need to think long and hard about who were putting in jail and why. I am a white Republican. I grew up in a small, rural town. I drive a pickup truck. I own guns and play in a country band. You cant get much more culturally white than me. I understand whiteness completely. White folks, lend me your ear. Here is something I know to be true. Black people get pulled over more than we do. Especially when they drive in white places like Clayton and Chesterfield. Can we agree on this? If youve been around, you know what I mean. The law is in search of bodies. Police are looking for criminals to arrest. However we got here and whoevers fault it was, black people are more likely to get pulled over in a car or stopped while walking on the street. When you get stopped, things happen. Tickets get written. Citizen gets an attitude. Cop gets an attitude. Weed gets found. Fines multiply. Court dates get missed, warrants get issued. Once the law gets its claws in you, you better know the right things to say, or have the money to make it go away. If you have more of these interactions you have more chances to make a mistake. A friend of mine was falsely accused of a crime. The cops came into his apartment and roughed him up. He was in the St. Louis City Jail for a few days before anybody knew what happened. Nobody I called at the jail would help. They said he wasnt there. They hung up on me. They couldnt disclose any information. I finally got answers because I was persistent and kept speaking well. I went to college. I have nine friends who practice law. I started calling them and found my friend an attorney - one who was willing to start working without any money up front because my lawyer friend vouched for me and the case. Calls were made, bail was set at $30,000, cash only. My friend in jail has parents who have worked their whole lives. They cashed in their retirement account and wired it to my wife, whom they had never met. A band mate of mine drove us to Clayton to withdraw the cash. We went to the courthouse and paid the bond. They set him free and he beat the case. My friend was innocent. It took dozens of people working together and a bunch of time and money to straighten things out. Go down this road with me for a minute. Imagine everybody in this story was black and from North County. Imagine I didnt speak white English. Image I didnt have enough minutes on my phone to keep calling the jail. That I knew some lawyers, but they needed money up front that none of us had. That his parents didnt have good jobs and a retirement account, or they didnt feel like they could trust sending that money to a stranger in their community? If any of this had been the case, my friend would still be in jail instead of holding the respectable and important job he has today. Multiply this story by thousands, add in arrests for people in non-violent drug crimes, add in bench warrants for not showing up to court, add lost jobs and ones that can never be had because of a criminal record, add a dad in jail and you have a problem. Its not their problem. Its OUR problem as white people. Someone is drowning in the swimming pool we built and we are standing there with a long stick in our hand, watching a man drown. We wonder why he just doesnt swim already. Out there somewhere there is a black man that would just as soon kill me as look at me. There is another one who would love to break into my house and steal everything Ive ever worked for. One who would laugh at me trying to help and punch me in the face. They dont speak for the majority. Not even close. Too many black men are in jail and the number one reason they are there is for non-violent drug offenses. The true violence is often drug related. We need to reform our drug policy first, by legalizing and decriminalizing, and we as white people can do it. If youre wondering what to do to make it better, start by helping people get out of the law trap.
Posted on: Sun, 17 Aug 2014 00:03:26 +0000
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