so, this was a comment posted by Adam Mordecai of Upworthy on the Upworthy page. Im posting this on here to endorse that comment and article. the links wont register as they are just copy and pastes but you should get the message regardless. Earlier yesterday morning I wrote a rage infused profanity laced rant about#Ferguson with the intention of getting some things off my chest. I thought about it for a while, but in the end, I deleted it. Because all it would do would reinforce peoples existing beliefs and then wed all end up yelling past each other. Im not interested in rehashing the specifics of this particular case. (I mean, I am, I think its completely screwed up how the prosecutor pretended he was a defense attorney, but I digress.) If we hash out the merits of who saw what, when, Ill have a small vociferous group of loud commenters telling me justice was served, theyll yell something about black-on-black crime being a thing, and then Ill get all shrill and partisan and then well be back to square one. Yes, the previous paragraph makes me a hypocrite. Deal with it. I needed to vent. All I want out of this particular post is an acknowledgement that the current system doesnt work. That intentionally or unintentionally, police arent able to do their job impartially and rationally anymore. That the black community is justified in being incredibly mistrustful of a system that actively treats them like second class citizens. That black teens are shot per capita at a 21x higher rate than white kids, and that math cant be attributed to some cartoonish stereotype that they commit more crime. 21x as much crime just isnt reality. propublica.org/.../deadly-force-in-black-and... There have to be biases at play, consciously or subconsciously. At some point the police switched from protecting citizens to becoming a militarized law enforcement racket that demands obedience from a community that they havent even earned the right to ask for trust from. We need transparency. We need cameras on every cop. We need some damned accountability. The lead prosecutor, Robert McCullough, has an amazing track record of getting a trial when he wants one for criminals. Yet he is 0 for 5 when attempting to get a trial for a police officer. He cant get a trial because he doesnt want to get one. Thats messed up. His job is to prosecute those who break the law. Yet he wont. He is yet another example of a large scale issue across the country. Hes the poster child for why we cant have nice things. Hes not a special snowflake. Theres a McCullough in almost every county in the country. They arent interested in justice. They are interested in their next election. I have friends who are police. And I trust the hell out of them. I think they are doing a thankless job in an unforgiving environment against impossible odds. But for every one of them, theres a trigger happy cowboy like Darren Wilson, who gets to skirt responsibility, who seems to be above the law, who bullies citizens and whom actually makes life worse for good police and citizens all over the country. He apparently went on TV to say that he regrets nothing, that although he is sad for the loss of life, hed do it all the same if he had the choice again. Think about that. Hes saying hes unapologetic about triggering one of the most significant moments of social unrest in 2 decades. He has learned nothing. Hes a trigger happy manchild who sees the world in black and white and got away with murder (Dont get me wrong, hes innocent until proven guilty, so I look forward to him getting his day in court. Oh wait, we cant do that now.) Sorry, Im getting shrill and angry again. And for every future Darren Wilson, well have other Mike Browns who will be tried in the court of public opinion, who will be completely innocent (please spare me the hes no angel argument. Hes dead. And many others who werent him also are dead. Because of the system.) For example in the last 3 months: 22-year-old Darrien Hunt, who was carrying a cosplay sword, gunned down with no justification or consequences:usatoday/.../utah-police-shooting/18102775/ 22-year-old John Crawford, who was air rifle shopping and talking to family on the phone in a Walmart when he was gunned down without warning for no reason: reason/.../police-shoot-man-holding-fake... And this weekend, Tamir Rice, who was brandishing a gun at police in a park. Or was a 12-year-old playing with a toy gun. It depends on who you ask.usatoday/.../24/cleveland-shot-boy/19471925/ Theres 11 more teenagers listed here: thedailybeast/.../the-14-teens-killed-by... Hopefully you care. I wont be surprised if many of you wont. I want to trust the cops. I want kids to be able to say, I wanna be a cop at their Kindergarten graduation, because being a cop is an honorable and noble profession that helps serve the public good and protects our families. But kids wont be able to say that if they only protect half the families. The reality is, if you open your eyes at all, the system is fundamentally broken. Im not accusing you of being racist if you disagree. Im not even calling cops in general racist. Im simply stating that the system is broken and it disproportionately impacts people of color. Its really simple math. Its a system that takes advantage of and gouges the poor to sustain the economy. In Ferguson, people are kept poor through fines and tickets. Thats insane.washingtonpost/.../how-st-louis-county.../ And we need to do something to fix it. And fixing it doesnt mean conjuring up the mythical black-on-black crime canard. It means actually addressing the problem where it is perpetuated. In our institutions of power that should be required to be held to a higher standard, because thats their damn job. Body cams, community policing training, paying them what they are worth, teaching them how to protect rather than punish, having separate entities that police the police and hold them accountable when they are in the wrong. All of these things will take time. But we can not continue on the path were on. Its a one way ticket to more Fergusons. If youve read this all the way to the end, thank you. Sorry for the shrillness.
Posted on: Thu, 27 Nov 2014 01:15:25 +0000
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