Thursday, December 4, 2014

Ugly Consequences

The deaths of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, and Eric Garner in New York City, have fueled chaos and unjustly reinforced stereo types of both police and minorities. Both killings involve an unarmed black male and one or more white police officers.  More troublesome, both involve a relatively minor crimes. No one videoed Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson's  shooting of Mike Brown; however, officer Daniel Pantaleo's choking of Garner was recorded and shown to by the media. Different yet similar in that both result in the dark side of humanity.
Wilson apparently fired his gun 12 times at Brown.  Probably 5 or 6 bullets hit their mark. Was Brown trying to surrender or was he attacking the officer?  We may never know. As for Garner, he did offer some resistance to arrest when he apparently refused to be handcuffed; however, was his death from compression of his neck and chest unwarranted?
Both Garner (6-foot-3 and 350 pounds) and Brown (6-foot-5 and 289 pounds) may have played a factor leading to aggression in the officers. Regardless, however, the deaths are troublesome even if the grand juries found the actions not warranting criminal charges. However, even more troublesome are the angry protests, riots and destruction that have taken place. Non peaceful reaction by minorities only fuels the stereo type that minorities are dangerous and thus excessive force may be needed for a police officer to enforce compliance.   
A law enforcement officers job is very stressful and can at any time end in disability or death. The life of a minority growing up with the constant struggle of overcome prejudice and inequities can be taxing and also extremely stressful.  Education of both police and young males of all ethnic backgrounds need to take place with true dialogue, not shouting or violence.  A police force's diversity should be consistent with the ratio of ethnicity of the community that they serve and protect.  Funding should also be raised for mandatory body cams on officers.  Video tape of encounters would keep both officers and detainees on their best behavior and quite frankly, document behavior that is inconsistent with common sense.  
End the darkness, the violence and the ignorance.  Now is the time for education, dialogue and solutions so that the day may be near when color becomes relevant only to the crayola that one chooses to use..

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Switch chants of "no justice, no peace" to "Education, funding and Understanding."

Anonymous said...

Evil seeks the dark

Anonymous said...

"A police force's diversity should be consistent with the ratio of ethnicity of the community that they serve and protect."

No. Not necessarily.
The population of the city they are trying to protect needs to wise up a LOT.

Anonymous said...

Anon 12-15-14, until city government becomes a bit more wise, riots will continue. If the cop in Ferguson has been black or if there were a fair representation of blacks on the force, it would be easier to see this incident as not racial profiling by a white cop.