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alexandraerinI almost didn't post this... but since ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
popelizbet tells me it's International Blog Against Racism Week, I decided to go ahead and ride out the wank. If I can man the battlements to engage in internet arguments over Dungeons and Dragons, I can do it for this.
...
Okay, so here in Omaha, there's a "joke".
The "joke" has been most memorably phrased to me as police code NWO7... as in, the sirens go on and someone says, "Must be an NWO7 in progress." WO7 stands for "West Of 72nd". I'll let you guess what the N stands for, but if you know the answer, for the love of God don't shout it out.
The flipside of the "joke" of course is white folks being afraid, with varying degrees of seriousness, of going east of 72nd. The exact line of demarcation for what's considered the safe part of town varies from person to person... usually depending on how far west one lives. I've had people who live way out in West O act shocked that I'm around the 90s.
And of course, my neighborhood does have people of many races living here... and even if you go all the way out to Oakview you won't see a completely whitewashed crowd.
But the "joke" is there, and it's based on a hard truth. Not the truth that cops are all racist bastards, but the truth that racism exists. It is extant. It is part of the fabric of our society, in a pernicious fashion.
Cops exercise a broad amount of discretion in determining who they pull over, who they stop, who they question, who they move along. A lot of the stuff they consciously scan for... who looks like they belong, who looks like they don't, who looks like they're up to no good, who fits a "profile", who looks like they've got a reason to be somewhere... can be coded to race even if the officer expresses no overt racism.
It can be argued that when someone is pulled over or stopped, they have no way of knowing if their race had anything to do with it or not. And to those of us who are comfortably white, this might seem like an argument against "playing the victim card"... but honestly, I have to say I think the reverse is true. Because the truth is that most racial minorities (this post was spurred by cases involving African-Americans in particular, but I'm not going to start a laundry list because I know I'd leave someone out) do attract disproportionate amounts of official attention and suspicion and therefore when they're the ones that cops stop, or when they have cops knocking on their doors in the middle of the night to follow up on a sketchy report, or when they're the ones that cops single out of everybody hanging out in a parking or parking lot and ask them if they don't have somewhere else to be, they always have reason to wonder if it's not their race.
Almost anybody who's been pulled over for speeding knows the feeling of being singled out unfairly. If you're white, it generally stays personal: the cop's a dick, who pissed in his Grape Nuts, give an asshole a badge and he thinks he's God, etc. And because it's personal, you can go on about your day, bitching about Asshole Cop in your mind or even forgetting about him... you're not seriously worried that the next cruiser you see is going to do the same thing. You don't have to worry every time you see a cop.
If you had any reason to think, Is this because I'm white?, it would be a different experience.
So most people who are targeted by cops have no way of knowing for sure if their race made a difference in that particular case... but knowing that it happens, they have two choices: shut up and place nice and hope that the encounter doesn't become more than a temporary and embarrassing hassle, or confront. Some people would say it's never wise to confront the cops or that it's not fair to confront someone with an accusation of racism without proof.
To the latter, I will say that if the Gold Standard of being able to talk about racism is having proof on the order of someone saying, "Man, I've been waiting all day to pull over one of you types!", then we need to give up because racism wins forever.
To the former, I would agree that it seems like the safest course of action to not confront, in the short term, but in the long term... again, racism wins forever.
And this is why, even if Professor Henry Louis Gates's response to being called out of his home in the middle of the night was more "disorderly" than his own account claims, I cannot agree with anyone who says that he should have known better or that the cop was within his rights to respond by arresting him, or that this is not a matter for national attention.
The police officer was in his rights? What about the professor's rights? He was in his home. English common law recognized that "a man's home is his castle" even back when they had a real monarchy and all the tyranny that we eventually revolted from. The police had more need to demonstrate their reason for being there than he had to demonstrate his right to be there.
Sure, if someone said, "But wouldn't you be glad for the police's protection if they kept an intruder from invading your 'castle'?",
I would agree... but that wouldn't stop me from trying to verify their identity and their reason for being there if they knocked on my door in the middle of the night... and we come back to the fact that I could write it off as just a weird random happenstance.
There would be no reason for me to look for a larger pattern, it would just be a crazy story I could tell at parties, if I ever went to parties: "Let me tell you about the one time I came home late, and someone saw me struggling with the door and thought I was a burglar..."
Of course, I do belong to a few non-racial minorities that have been known to be targeted by police, and if there was at all a reason to think this was a factor, then for me to meekly comply and then laugh it off the next morning would be to validate that kind of discrimination, to give it license and strength.
So, if the question is put to me: do I think cops should just have to take it when they get called racist for doing their jobs?
That's the wrong question.
The question is, should the citizens that police officers exist to serve and protect just have to take it when they have reason to doubt they're being served and protected? That question applies to all people, obviously, but if the answer is that no, we should not, then as long as we know that racism exists (which we do know) and that it affects how police do their jobs (which we do know) then we can't ignore race as a factor in police interactions with the public. Even without proof in a particular case that the officer is an admitted racist or acted on racist impulses. It can't be ignored.
Oh, well, we (speaking to those of us comfortably white and comfortably middle class) can ignore it. We have that privilege. But it's not our place to judge when others choose not to, to call them stupid for asking the questions that we habitually avoid.
And we can sound so sophisticated when we duck them, too.
"It's tempting to see something as simple as a racial dynamic at work, but I see a more complicated question of class." is a popular one, but cases like that of Professor Gates, or Denzel Washington being unable to get a cab in New York, or then-General Colin Powell being stiff-armed by airport security, or actor Jeffrey Wright being ejected from a bar and tasered by cops show us the truth... presumably when these men find themselves on the receiving end of discrimination and official harassment, it's not because those doing it have identified them as wealthy successful men of color, but because of how dark skin "codes" to them: low class, no business being there, could be trouble.
Likewise, there was an article in Forbes explaining how the real issue was not one of race but of broader first amendment questions, and it raised some excellent points about the liberties that cops have taken with our liberties, but the existence of those points don't actually eliminate the racial side.
And that's the bottom line: yes, I'd believe the police officer if he said that anyone who had responded to that visitation the same would have been given the same response from the police, but it wasn't anyone who got the visit and not just anyone would have had good reason to believe their race was a factor.
Anyone who did receive such a visit and did suspect so would have had every right to speak out against it.
It's not the "smart" (meaning "safe") thing to do but it beats the alternative.
popelizbet tells me it's International Blog Against Racism Week, I decided to go ahead and ride out the wank. If I can man the battlements to engage in internet arguments over Dungeons and Dragons, I can do it for this....
Okay, so here in Omaha, there's a "joke".
The "joke" has been most memorably phrased to me as police code NWO7... as in, the sirens go on and someone says, "Must be an NWO7 in progress." WO7 stands for "West Of 72nd". I'll let you guess what the N stands for, but if you know the answer, for the love of God don't shout it out.
The flipside of the "joke" of course is white folks being afraid, with varying degrees of seriousness, of going east of 72nd. The exact line of demarcation for what's considered the safe part of town varies from person to person... usually depending on how far west one lives. I've had people who live way out in West O act shocked that I'm around the 90s.
And of course, my neighborhood does have people of many races living here... and even if you go all the way out to Oakview you won't see a completely whitewashed crowd.
But the "joke" is there, and it's based on a hard truth. Not the truth that cops are all racist bastards, but the truth that racism exists. It is extant. It is part of the fabric of our society, in a pernicious fashion.
Cops exercise a broad amount of discretion in determining who they pull over, who they stop, who they question, who they move along. A lot of the stuff they consciously scan for... who looks like they belong, who looks like they don't, who looks like they're up to no good, who fits a "profile", who looks like they've got a reason to be somewhere... can be coded to race even if the officer expresses no overt racism.
It can be argued that when someone is pulled over or stopped, they have no way of knowing if their race had anything to do with it or not. And to those of us who are comfortably white, this might seem like an argument against "playing the victim card"... but honestly, I have to say I think the reverse is true. Because the truth is that most racial minorities (this post was spurred by cases involving African-Americans in particular, but I'm not going to start a laundry list because I know I'd leave someone out) do attract disproportionate amounts of official attention and suspicion and therefore when they're the ones that cops stop, or when they have cops knocking on their doors in the middle of the night to follow up on a sketchy report, or when they're the ones that cops single out of everybody hanging out in a parking or parking lot and ask them if they don't have somewhere else to be, they always have reason to wonder if it's not their race.
Almost anybody who's been pulled over for speeding knows the feeling of being singled out unfairly. If you're white, it generally stays personal: the cop's a dick, who pissed in his Grape Nuts, give an asshole a badge and he thinks he's God, etc. And because it's personal, you can go on about your day, bitching about Asshole Cop in your mind or even forgetting about him... you're not seriously worried that the next cruiser you see is going to do the same thing. You don't have to worry every time you see a cop.
If you had any reason to think, Is this because I'm white?, it would be a different experience.
So most people who are targeted by cops have no way of knowing for sure if their race made a difference in that particular case... but knowing that it happens, they have two choices: shut up and place nice and hope that the encounter doesn't become more than a temporary and embarrassing hassle, or confront. Some people would say it's never wise to confront the cops or that it's not fair to confront someone with an accusation of racism without proof.
To the latter, I will say that if the Gold Standard of being able to talk about racism is having proof on the order of someone saying, "Man, I've been waiting all day to pull over one of you types!", then we need to give up because racism wins forever.
To the former, I would agree that it seems like the safest course of action to not confront, in the short term, but in the long term... again, racism wins forever.
And this is why, even if Professor Henry Louis Gates's response to being called out of his home in the middle of the night was more "disorderly" than his own account claims, I cannot agree with anyone who says that he should have known better or that the cop was within his rights to respond by arresting him, or that this is not a matter for national attention.
The police officer was in his rights? What about the professor's rights? He was in his home. English common law recognized that "a man's home is his castle" even back when they had a real monarchy and all the tyranny that we eventually revolted from. The police had more need to demonstrate their reason for being there than he had to demonstrate his right to be there.
Sure, if someone said, "But wouldn't you be glad for the police's protection if they kept an intruder from invading your 'castle'?",
I would agree... but that wouldn't stop me from trying to verify their identity and their reason for being there if they knocked on my door in the middle of the night... and we come back to the fact that I could write it off as just a weird random happenstance.
There would be no reason for me to look for a larger pattern, it would just be a crazy story I could tell at parties, if I ever went to parties: "Let me tell you about the one time I came home late, and someone saw me struggling with the door and thought I was a burglar..."
Of course, I do belong to a few non-racial minorities that have been known to be targeted by police, and if there was at all a reason to think this was a factor, then for me to meekly comply and then laugh it off the next morning would be to validate that kind of discrimination, to give it license and strength.
So, if the question is put to me: do I think cops should just have to take it when they get called racist for doing their jobs?
That's the wrong question.
The question is, should the citizens that police officers exist to serve and protect just have to take it when they have reason to doubt they're being served and protected? That question applies to all people, obviously, but if the answer is that no, we should not, then as long as we know that racism exists (which we do know) and that it affects how police do their jobs (which we do know) then we can't ignore race as a factor in police interactions with the public. Even without proof in a particular case that the officer is an admitted racist or acted on racist impulses. It can't be ignored.
Oh, well, we (speaking to those of us comfortably white and comfortably middle class) can ignore it. We have that privilege. But it's not our place to judge when others choose not to, to call them stupid for asking the questions that we habitually avoid.
And we can sound so sophisticated when we duck them, too.
"It's tempting to see something as simple as a racial dynamic at work, but I see a more complicated question of class." is a popular one, but cases like that of Professor Gates, or Denzel Washington being unable to get a cab in New York, or then-General Colin Powell being stiff-armed by airport security, or actor Jeffrey Wright being ejected from a bar and tasered by cops show us the truth... presumably when these men find themselves on the receiving end of discrimination and official harassment, it's not because those doing it have identified them as wealthy successful men of color, but because of how dark skin "codes" to them: low class, no business being there, could be trouble.
Likewise, there was an article in Forbes explaining how the real issue was not one of race but of broader first amendment questions, and it raised some excellent points about the liberties that cops have taken with our liberties, but the existence of those points don't actually eliminate the racial side.
And that's the bottom line: yes, I'd believe the police officer if he said that anyone who had responded to that visitation the same would have been given the same response from the police, but it wasn't anyone who got the visit and not just anyone would have had good reason to believe their race was a factor.
Anyone who did receive such a visit and did suspect so would have had every right to speak out against it.
It's not the "smart" (meaning "safe") thing to do but it beats the alternative.
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no subject
on 2009-07-29 05:25 pm (UTC)Initially when I read about this I wasn't sure if it was perceived or actual racism, but the more information that comes out the more I am convinced that it was actual racism. I don't think it was just Crowley, though; it was systemic. The police officers responding don't get to hear the 911 call, he didn't know that it wasn't definitely an intruder, or that the caller initially identified the man as Hispanic and not black, or that she said they had suitcases and not backpacks (and why would an intruder have suitcases with him?). He just knew that "there were 2 black guys who may or may not have broken into this house." Then, when Gates responded, as many people would, black of not, offended at the accusation that he had broken into his own home, all Crowley saw was the Angry Black Man threatening him and he went into fight or flight mode, which for the police is fight, or subdue and arrest. That's a racist reaction, but it's not necessarily a consciously racist reaction, he may or may not actively be racist, but he has those ingrained preconceptions that out society isn't going to be rid of until they've been aged out.
no subject
on 2009-07-29 08:38 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-07-29 05:45 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-07-30 04:05 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-07-30 11:59 pm (UTC)Further reading...
on 2009-07-29 08:02 pm (UTC)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contempt_of_cop
Indeed!
on 2009-07-29 10:19 pm (UTC)I'm not sure where the apparently irresistable urge to downplay the racism elements/angles of this case comes from (well, okay, yes I am, but let's pretend I'm feeling charitable here), but it's one of the more irksome reactions to the whole thing!
no subject
on 2009-07-30 12:03 am (UTC)You have the right to insult and berate police officers all you want, that's what freedom of speech means. At no time has there been any allegation that Gates used anything other than words, which means he was fully within his rights. The police officer was stupid, and decided abuse his powers illegally to put Gates in his place.
Race may or may not have entered into why they behaved the way they did, but it's clear that the police officer abused his powers, and Gates was fully within his rights.
no subject
on 2009-07-30 03:28 am (UTC)no subject
on 2009-07-30 04:22 am (UTC)no subject
on 2009-07-30 12:54 pm (UTC)If he was arrested for assault or harassment, perhaps this would hold some water.
no subject
on 2009-07-30 02:48 pm (UTC)You do have the right to yell at and berate members of the public, although it's not something I'd recommend or do. Just because it isn't OK or smart doesn't make it illegal. You particularly have the right to yell at people while on your own property, having established that you are the owner and resident and they aren't leaving once it's clear you are doing nothing wrong.
Again, I don't say what Gates did was smart or polite, but it was fully legal and there's no way he should have been arrested on charges of, essentially, attempting to start a riot.
no subject
on 2009-07-30 04:06 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-07-30 05:28 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-07-30 05:30 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-07-30 05:36 pm (UTC)I'm sure you'd have absolutely no problem whatsoever spending your afternoon and evening this way after a 20 hour flight from China.
no subject
on 2009-07-30 05:52 pm (UTC)They both over reacted. If the cop hadn't over reacted, Gates wouldn't have been hauled in, with the charge later dropped.
But- he's a cop. They routinely do that when people yell at them. Why? Some of it's abuse of power. And some of it is that they never know who will escalate to the next level of violence.
He's at someone else's home, he doesn't know how the person is going to react, he doesn't know what weapons are there, he has no knowledge of the space, and a person yelling means that the situation is Not under control. By moving the person, he can get better control the situation.
I read taking someone downtown as a tool they can use to cool off when they're pissed at the person and need someone calmer to judge the situation. Arrest them all and let the law sort them out.
I'd be pissed as hell if I got home from a long trip, my door malfunctioned thanks to a burglary a month or so ago, and I get a cop knocking on my door to see if I'M a burglar.
But, by virtue of their good standing with the police force, as evidenced by them being on duty, they are- in fact- an authority figure. They are underpaid to deal with people who are having the worst day of their lives. They are underpaid when they never know if they'll get shot at the next time they pull over someone for speeding.
no subject
on 2009-07-30 06:00 pm (UTC)All he had to do was say "Someone thought that it might have been a break-in because of the stuck door. I apologize for taking up your time but I need to get your version of events for the case file. Is now a convenient time for me to do that or would you like me to give you my card so you can come down to the station at a more convenient time?"
But he didn't do that because he was pissed off that Gates wasn't kowtowing to him and he wanted to teach him a lesson. Whether it was a racist reaction or not it was still the wrong reaction and an abuse of power.
no subject
on 2009-07-30 06:04 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-07-30 06:12 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-07-30 06:17 pm (UTC)Sometimes people just take a dislike to you and knowing when to let someone else handle the situation is what he feels is the better thing to do.
no subject
on 2009-07-30 06:19 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-07-30 06:46 pm (UTC)the police report: http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/years/2009/0723092gates1.html
Where Crowley said stop yelling or I'll have to arrest you, warning him at least twice. Gates admits to yelling for his badge number and saying this wouldn't happen if he were white. I can see it very easy for both versions to be true- Gates was too upset to hear the answer and may have missed hearing both the name/badge number and the request to quiet down.
I doubt the police department would back Crowley if his microphone, which was recording most of this, didn't back his statements of what he said and asked for.
no subject
on 2009-07-30 06:52 pm (UTC)When I was 21 I worked as a waitress. On New Year's Eve on the corner of the block where the restaurant I worked at was a couple of police officers were chasing after a car. They decided to start shooting at it and an innocent bystander was shot and killed. The policed backed them too.
no subject
on 2009-07-30 06:48 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-07-30 06:49 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-07-30 07:04 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-08-01 08:31 pm (UTC)Or perhaps he confused something there, like, who told him what, and if anybody at all told him that or he just imagined somebody having told him something specific. This wouldn't exactly be a sign of lack of professionalism, but being confused about certain details rarely helps your case.
no subject
on 2009-07-30 06:00 pm (UTC)If the sole concern was about not escalating the situation, the officers could have simply departed.
no subject
on 2009-07-30 07:14 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-07-30 07:16 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-07-30 07:21 pm (UTC)Fighting words are words or phrases that are likely to induce the listener to get in a fight. This previously applied to words like nigger, but with people getting less sensitive to words, this exception is little-used. Restrictions on hate speech have been generally overturned by the courts; such speech cannot be targeted for its content but may be targeted in other ways, if it involves speech beyond the First Amendment's protection like incitement to immediate violence or defamation. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_speech_in_the_United_States#Types_of_restraints_on_speech)
no subject
on 2009-07-30 11:53 pm (UTC)Any time you can look at an action by a public official and it can be summed up with, "Well, this is pretty much the way it would be in high school if the other person were a minor and their job was to maintain order, not be fair or even decent," they are doing it wrong.
no subject
on 2009-07-30 05:31 pm (UTC)And that is especially true if they are on your property and refuse to leave, even if they're cops.
no subject
on 2009-07-30 07:05 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-07-30 07:09 pm (UTC)Stop grasping at straws; I'm done with you.
no subject
on 2009-07-30 07:19 pm (UTC)I choose to believe that a cop has the right to bring someone in for further questioning under the charge of disorderly conduct when they refuse to control their behavior after being asked to calm down.
no subject
on 2009-07-30 07:21 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-07-30 07:25 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-07-30 07:28 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-07-30 11:45 pm (UTC)Neither your choice OR belief have anything to do with the rights or responsibilities of the officers, save that if you choose to hold to that belief when it fails to reflect reality, that is... a bit nuts.
If you're saying that, to the best of your understanding, this is how the law works, that's one thing. It might be better if you provided some statute or case law that supported this understanding, though.
no subject
on 2009-07-31 01:47 pm (UTC)Looking back, I'm just trying to state that there is a precedent for law officers to bring someone in for a misdemeanor that is later dropped, when they are argumentative with a cop. It's not by law allowed; but it is done quite often, and I understand why they do it.
Either because they're loosing their temper, or they feel the individual in question needs time to cool down, or because they feel physically safer on their own turf.
no subject
on 2009-08-01 08:49 pm (UTC)So what? It's wrong, and they're wrong, and it doesn't matter why they're wrong.
no subject
on 2009-07-30 04:02 pm (UTC)However...
Lashing out at the officers in the heat of the moment will almost always do more harm than good. IMHO, it is NEVER a good idea to attack, even verbally, the cop who is confronting you. Being an officer of the law is becoming an increasingly more dangerous occupation. One need only look at the statistics for how often "routine" encounters leave officers injured or killed. Their nerves are already on edge whenever they enter a confrontation, and they are watching for any sign that they, or their colleagues, are in imminent danger. Their training conditions them to respond, and if they feel threatened you will be cuffed, or possibly worse.
Your best bet, then, is to be polite and cooperate with the officers...Even if you don't agree with why they are there and asking. If you feel you must protest you can say so, and be firm about it. Do not be belligerent about it, though. Once the situation is resolved, speak out. Go through "proper channels" by filing a complaint, talk to your lawyer, talk to your government. Write letters and speak to the press if need be.
My opinion, YMMV
no subject
on 2009-07-30 05:57 pm (UTC)So if I'm writing a manual about how to survive encounters with law enforcement, I'm not including anything much more than "shut up and obey". But if I'm commenting on the huge negative public reaction to someone speaking up? Fuck that - speaking up may not always be safe, but it's not wrong or objectionable.
no subject
on 2009-08-01 10:52 am (UTC)The official version seems to almost claim that angry yelling somehow limits police officers' ability to move freely, and that their arrest of him was justified by way of them being falsely arrested. (As in, their ability to move freely being arrested falsely.)