The main problem I have with the grassroots refrain that “Black Lives Matter,” is the whitewashing of the facts of these cases make us seem like hypocrites in the eyes of whites and others. It is not the marches or the protests in and of themselves that damage our claims, but our insistence on fitting these victims with halos to prop them up and make them seem more innocent and, therefore, more deserving of our outrage over their deaths.
“Don't
say anything”
This was the advice, captured by the mic of University of
Cincinnati Police Officer Phillip Kidd’s body camera as he and
several other officers secured the crime scene where U of C Officer
Ray Tensing fatally shot Samuel DuBose, 43, an unarmed black man,
whom Tensing had pulled over for not having a front license plate on
his ’98 Honda. Kidd’s recording captured Officer Tensing twice
claiming he shot DuBose because he was being dragged by DuBose’s
car, and Kidd is heard on the recording confirming Tensing’s
account, “I saw that, I saw that.” But Tensing’s own body camera
provides a very different account, where DuBose is seen attempting
to close his car door with his left hand after restarting his engine
and shifting the car into drive with his right. Tensing is shown, on
camera, firing the fatal shot almost immediately after DuBose closes
his car door. The car itself is not moving when the shot is fired,
and Tensing appears to stumble back as a result of the pistol recoil
as the car rolls downhill, DuBose dead at the wheel.
There is, evidently, no question this was yet another unwarranted
shooting by armed black police on an unarmed black suspect, but
claims by DuBose’s sister that, “…my brother was absolutely
innocent” undermine the very social justice she seeks. As I’ve
ranted about
previously, the main problem I have with the grassroots refrain
that “Black Lives Matter,” is the whitewashing of the facts of these
cases make us seem like hypocrites in the eyes of whites and others.
It is not the marches or the protests in and of themselves that
damage our claims, but our insistence on fitting these victims with
halos to prop them up and make them seem more innocent and,
therefore, more deserving of our outrage over their deaths.
DuBose was in no way “completely innocent.” He was clearly, I mean,
on video, intending to flee. I have no idea why or even why he
thought that would be a smart move. All Tensing had to do was call
in DuBose’s plate, and other officers would have picked him up
within blocks. I have no idea at all why Tensing thought it
necessary to pull his gun; he was not being threatened in any way. I
can only assume he pulled it to menace Dubose and order him out of
the vehicle, but his finger likely slipped on the trigger instead.
Past that, I can’t imagine why, given the charged political
atmosphere surrounding white cops and black suspects, he thought
assassinating this man for the crime of not having a front license
plate was a good idea.
Please understand: I’m not excusing the cops. What I’m saying is
Black America is lying, yes lying, when we flail and scream and riot
and burn stuff down with our outrage over police brutality and
corruption without admitting our own faults. Admitting Mr. DuBose’s
license was suspended or revoked would take absolutely nothing away
from the fact of Officer Tensing’s misconduct; why do we have to
paper over DuBose’s faults in order to accuse Tensing? DuBose
fearing arrest, panicking, preparing to flee, only makes him more
human. Claiming him to be “completely innocent” only provides
ammunition to those who are predisposed to demonize all blacks no
matter what. It’s impossible for us to demonize institutionalized
hypocrisy so long as we ourselves practice it.
Say Her Name
The same principle applies to Sandra Bland. Again, we have an
unarmed African American person being subject to a police officer
who appeared to be racially profiling and perhaps overly aggressive
in the execution of his duties. Failure to signal a lane change is,
come on, a pretty lame excuse to pull somebody over. It is one of
those excuses—like dirt on my license plate cover or, once, a claim
that I changed lanes while passing through an intersection—cops use
to pull people over they deem suspicious in some way. It seems
obvious, to me, Texas State Trooper Brian Encinia wanted to pull Bland over for some reason, and the lane switch simply
provided him specious grounds with which to do so.
However, Ms. Bland bears some responsibility for what happened from
there. None of us will ever know, for sure, what specifically
occurred or what motivated those actions, but Ms. Bland was clearly
being uncooperative—if not verbally abusive—to the officer. From
that point forward, the Black community’s efforts to paint Ms. Bland
as a martyr are endemically flawed.
This is my main problem with our community’s reaction to the spate
of obvious abuses by law enforcement upon African American citizens:
our dishonesty. We do what white conservatives do, ignore our own
culpability and replace a stoic, imperfect reality with some fairy
tale legend of saintly innocents being harassed by evil cops for no
reason.
With few notable exceptions (the tragic, unreasonable and
indefensible shooting of 12-year old Tamir Rice for one and,
certainly, the vigilante murder of Trayvon Martin), in virtually
each of these cases the black victim was either behaving criminally
or acting out histrionically rather than simply cooperating with the
police officer. This behavior immediately throws the officer's
conduct—no matter how obviously extreme or criminal—into contention
because the suspect was obviously being uncooperative and that lack
of cooperation could and likely will be characterized as
threatening. For police officers, fear is their ultimate defense: a
police officer in fear for his life is legally permitted to use
deadly force, and only the individual officer can determine whether
or not his fear was rational or justified. Literally all he need say
is, "I was afraid," and he is exonerated. Our yelling and cussing
and flailing about, slamming doors, walking away, jabbing fingers,
creates an atmosphere that is open to interpretation, whereas calm,
stoic cooperation does not. In many of these cases, it was the
victim who escalated the tension. This is certainly not
justification for the police's overreaction, but the black
community's pattern of glossing over these salient points undermines
our case against police misconduct.
Any misconduct on the part of the officer could and
should be addressed formally through the legal and or
political process. Instead, we fly off the hook and try to fight The
Man right in the moment, there on the street, where no justice can be done.
Disobeying the lawful command of a law enforcement officer is a
crime. You can be rightfully and legally locked up for that.
Flailing about, running away, or attacking an officer can get you
shot; it amazes me that we either don’t know this or refuse to
accept it as fact.
None of which is intended to justify any errant or stupid behavior
on the part of police officers. I’m just making the point that, by
arguing, resisting, throwing down in the street, we usually lose our
case in court. Cooperating with a cop—even a bad cop who is way out
of line—leaves all of the bad behavior clearly and evidentially on
the side of the police officer. The place to battle police abuse is
the courtroom. But many of us never make it to the courtroom because
of our culturally-bred lack of emotional discipline; our community’s
overwhelming tendency to give in to histrionic emotion rather than
use our intellect.
I grieve for Sandra Bland. I don’t know what happened to her in her
jail cell. Electronics can be easily manipulated. Cameras can be
turned off (there was a motion-activated camera outside her cell; it
could simply have been switched off). I just can’t imagine the
motive any cops or guards would have to assassinate this woman. What
threat did she pose? What message were they sending?
The subsequent histrionics—the shouting the marching, the
demanding—and the ludicrous claim, by Dupage AME’s Reverend Theresa
Dear, that Bland had, “…found her voice,” that she had, “…found her
purpose in social justice,” simply further erodes the black
community’s power to effect real change or address legitimate
wrongs. I grieve for her, but Ms. Bland was a documentedly troubled
young woman. Trying to spin this tragic and deeply saddening episode
into some sort of civil rights triumph not only does a disservice to
Ms. Bland but to the entire cause of social justice.
Inconvenient Truths
Every time we gloss over truth in an effort to construct a more convenient social justice narrative, we betray the very values our protests claim to espouse and we trample upon the memory of those who suffered and died in the very name of the principals we now exploit by papering over inconvenient truths. Social Justice is a tough nickel; we need to stop running to street corners screaming racism before all the facts are in, and we need to be honest about those facts inconvenient to us if we are to point fingers at anyone else..
Christopher J. Priest
2 August 2015
editor@praisenet.org
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