How Darren Wilson Demonized Michael Brown - from the Root

Some excepts I wanted to share.....Read the whole thing at the source.  It's pretty good.

Stereotypes are dangerous. And for Michael Brown, they proved to be deadly.

Of all that we heard Monday night about the St. Louis County grand jury’s decision not to indict Ferguson, Mo., Police Officer Darren Wilson for shooting and killing Brown, what kept me awake for hours after the announcement was made was Wilson’s testimony.

Testimony in which Wilson said that Brown “had the most intense aggressive face. The only way I can describe it, it looks like a demon, that’s how angry he looked.”

It was rife with imagery that dates back hundreds of years as it relates to how white men often perceive black men. His use of vivid language, describing Brown like “Hulk Hogan” while describing himself, in comparison, like a small child holding on for dear life, is troubling. This is the power and danger of racial “stereotypes.”

When we believe that another human being is in fact, not human, we remove ourselves from how we treat, and entreat, them. We justify prejudices. We justify disrespect. We justify dehumanization in ways that can, and often does, lead to tragedy.

.................................

The anger and violence that erupted last night in Ferguson is so much bigger than Brown’s tragic death though. It’s not really about whether Wilson was “justified” in taking a life. Or whether Brown robbed a grocery store for cigars, “charged” Wilson or caused the officer to fear for his life. It’s about a community that feels disenfranchised—and assaulted by the very officers sworn to protect them.

This American tragedy is about a longstanding history of “fear” between white law-enforcement officers and young black men (unarmed, in uniform, in suits or driving while black). And until we address that issue, we will continue to see more teens like Trayvon Martin stalked and gunned down by unarmed vigilantes like George Zimmerman. And we will continue to see the use of deadly force to “subdue” black male suspects who have not been given their fundamental rights of due process.

Ferguson Post Part 1

Well, by now, we all know that Officer Darren Wilson was not indicted for killing unarmed teenager, Michael Brown.  The jury believed that the officer acted within the rules of police conduct and that he was right to feel threatened by Brown.  According to prosecutor Bob McCulloch, the jury reached their decision based on the evidence and testimony from Wilson and black witnesses. 

I don’t know about you, but there’s something fishy going on here.  But I'll save that for the next post.  

Let me take a moment to say this. 

I’m sick of those who are on the side of Wilson, painting those who think he was wrong to shoot Brown as only going by emotion; constantly sprouting that blacks who are against Wilson believe that because Michael was black, he's innocent, and that white cops are always in the wrong!  Or those who believe that racism is only about whether someone is gunned down BECAUSE their black.  Or constantly complaining about Jesse Jackson this, Obama that, the mainstream/liberal media also!  These people miss the point entirely.

Could it be that people are against Wilson because what he did was wrong, and that the evidence and witness testimonies leave much to be desired, even straight up questionable (I'll get to that later).  Many white people say that the right decision was made and it was based on evidence, yet it was mostly white people who cried fowl when O. J. Simpson was set free.  The jury found him innocent based on evidence too....   

Racism isn't only about something being done to someone BECAUSE they're black.  It involves the views, feelings, and fear someone has, and stereotypes people hold, of another person that fuels their actions towards them.  Darren didn't kill Brown solely because he was black, but Brown being black influenced Darren to take actions he wouldn't necessarily have taken had Michael been white or even a hefty white woman.  The point is, many cops out right FEAR black people, especially black men, and that fear causes them to be skittish and jumpy.  And you can't be a cop and feel skittish. 

I heard this on the Steve Harvey Morning Show.  Blacks are used to being "the only one" in groups, whether it be in a class or work environment.  But whites, truth be told, aren't used to that.  Add being sent to areas where there are issues with crime and you got some scared white cops.

Another thing, the protesters in Ferguson being seen as ALL violent really upsets me.  I'm not excusing the rioters, but there were rioters and there were protesters.  Apparently, there was indeed peaceful protests in front of the police station, but of course no one mentions that.  And I got to tell you...while watching the live feed on MSNBC, at times it seems as if the cops were overzealous in controlling the citizens.  For example, threatening to arrest people if they didn't get out of the street and onto the sidewalk....really?  Not to mention at one point sending in TRUCKS that shot out teargas/smoke bombs/whichever it was.  The location where that took place, if I recall correctly, I didn't see any outright rioting.  To make it worse, people claim that tear gas was being flown into people's yards.

Again, I'm not excusing the rioters.  I know that bricks were thrown, a couple of cars set on fire, businesses vandalized, etc.  I'm just saying to not combine the rioters and protesters into one group.  And with the rioters being mostly black, people (especially whites) like to base the entire group on the actions of some.   

Up next, my thoughts on the shooting itself.

Thoughts on Ferguson

I know the whole Ferguson incident has been out of the media for awhile, but I wanted to get this off my chest.

In discussions and arguments I've read online about the Michael Brown shooting and Ferguson protests, common responses from mostly white people are along the lines of "what about black on black crime" or how no one makes a big deal about black on white crime.

For one thing, the blacks HAVE expressed concerns over issues like violence that goes on within the community.  There have been marches, meetings, etc., they just weren't nationally televised. 

Second point - when it comes to black on black crime, more often than not there's no question of guilt and the guilty party is rightfully put away.  On top of that:

On average, blacks receive almost 10% longer sentences than comparable whites arrested for the same crimes

And while we're at it:

From the Huffington Post

• Drugs. According to the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, among youths aged 12 to 17, the rate of current illicit drug use was 11.1 % among whites, and 9.3% among African Americans. [5] In a previous year, the same survey found that white youth aged 12 to17 are more than a third more likely to have sold drugs than African American youth. [6] The Monitoring the Future Survey of high school seniors shows that white students annually use cocaine at 4.6 times the rate of African Americans students, use crack cocaine at 1.5 times the rate of African Americans students, and use heroin at the same rate of African Americans students, and that white youth report annual use of marijuana at a rate 46% higher than African American youth. [7] However African American youth are arrested for drug offenses at about twice the rate (African American 314 per 100,000, white 175 per 100,000) times that of whites, [8] and African American youth represent nearly half (48%) of all the youth incarcerated for a drug offense in the juvenile justice system. [9]
• Weapons. According to the Center on Disease Control's annual Youth Risk Behavior Survey, in 2001 whites and African Americans reported similar rates of carrying a weapon (whites 17.9%, African Americans 15.2%), and similar rates of carrying a gun (whites 5.5%, and African Americans, 6.5%). [10] African American youth represent 32% of all weapons arrests, and were arrested for weapons offenses at a rate twice that of whites (69 per 100,000, versus 30 per 100,000). [11]
• Assault. According to the Center on Disease Control's annual Youth Risk Behavior Survey, African Americans report being in a physical fight at a similar rate (36.5%, versus 32.5% for whites), but were arrested for aggravated assault at a rate nearly three times that of whites (137 per 100,000, versus 48 per 100,000)

And I'll leave this here for the heck of it.

More about black on black crime.  From the Daily Beast:  The Trayvon Martin Killing and the Myth of Black-on-Black Crime.

 ....in Chicago, 16-year-old Darryl Green was found dead in the yard of an abandoned home. He was killed, relatives reported, because he refused to join a gang. Unlike most tragedies, however—which remain local news—this one caught the attention of conservative activist Ben Shapiro, an editor for Breitbart News. Using the hashtag “#justicefordarryl,” Shaprio tweeted and publicized the details of Green’s murder. But this wasn’t a call for help and assistance for Green’s family, rather, it was his response to wide outrage over Saturday’s decision in the case of George Zimmerman, where a Florida jury judged him “not guilty” of second-degree murder or manslaughter in the killing of Trayvon Martin.

Shapiro, echoing many other conservatives, is angry over the perceived politicization of the Zimmerman trial, and believes that activists have ”injected” race into the discussion, as if there’s nothing racial already within the criminal-justice system. Indeed, he echoes many conservatives when he complains that media attention had everything to do with Zimmerman’s race. If he were black, the argument goes, no one would care. And so, Shapiro found the sad story of Darryl Green, and promoted it as an example of the “black-on-black” crime that, he believes, goes ignored. Or, as he tweets, “49% of murder victims are black men. 93% of those are killed by other blacks. Media don’t care. Obama doesn’t care. #JusticeForDarryl.”

......But there’s a huge problem with attempt to shift the conversation: There’s no such thing as “black-on-black” crime. Yes, from 1976 to 2005, 94 percent of black victims were killed by black offenders, but that racial exclusivity was also true for white victims of violent crime—86 percent were killed by white offenders. Indeed, for the large majority of crimes, you’ll find that victims and offenders share a racial identity, or have some prior relationship to each other.

What Shapiro and others miss about crime, in general, is that it’s driven by opportunism and proximity; If African-Americans are more likely to be robbed, or injured, or killed by other African-Americans, it’s because they tend to live in the same neighborhoods as each other. Residential statistics bear this out (PDF); blacks are still more likely to live near each other or other minority groups than they are to whites. And of course, the reverse holds as well—whites are much more likely to live near other whites than they are to minorities and African-Americans in particular.

.....“Black-on-black crime” has been part of the American lexicon for decades, but as a specific phenomenon, it’s no more real than “white-on-white crime.” Unlike the latter, however, the idea of “black-on-black crime” taps into specific fears around black masculinity and black criminality—the same fears that, in Florida, led George Zimmerman to focus his attention on Trayvon Martin, and in New York, continue to justify Michael Bloomberg’s campaign of police harassment against young black men in New York City.

Now about black on white crime.

It turns out that "most death sentences are handed out for killing white people, even though African-Americans make up 50% of murder victims (they are only 12% of the population)".

In other words,

....if an African-American male had fired ten shots into the SUV of some white suburban kids playing their music too loud, killing one of them, I think we all know there would have been a murder conviction and almost certainly a death penalty imposed.
In case of conviction for murder, African-Americans are 38% more likely to be handed the death penalty than members of other racial groupings.

So basically, when it comes to black on white crime, the conviction of blacks is pretty much guaranteed.  Again, there's not really a questions of guilt.

Then there's this article.

Lastly, one thing that bothered me was the news and media take on the protests.  They basically combined the rioters and the protesters into one group and gave the impression that the protesters were the ones violent.  That was not true; there was no differentiation between the rioters and the protesters.  To make matters worse, the police treated the protesters as if they were the violent ones.  In a continuation post, I plan on posting tweets and pictures recounting the protests and violence from the ones there.