Distorting the Peace
Crystal,
Our conversation this morning did move me to consider again what racism in law enforcement means for public safety.
You and I have different ideas about what actions are safe versus unsafe, with me sometimes teasing you for being overly cautious. Some of this has to do with the fact that you were born and raised in New York City and I, in Charleston, SC. But skin color definately informs our feelings of security in the world.
Some of your earliest memories are of police attacking your family with ruthless violence.
Meanwhile, other than traffic tickets and routine interactions with police, the only time police officers came to my childhood home were when they were called by my family. In several instances, this occurred, after domestic disputes, and when they arrived, they were extremely supportive, not threatening or domineering.
Luck does not account for such disparate treatment, especially knowing the research that proves our experiences are not exceptional.
While Black men in America are no longer at high risk of being lynched or bludgeoned to death in the name of white women, we know they are profiled by law enforcement in a number of ways. Meanwhile, white women continue to be upheld as the pearls of society, with more resources devoted to their protection and uplift (sentences that punish attacks on white women more harshly, and affirmative action plans that benefit white women more than any other demographic).
The arrest of Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. last week is a concrete example of profiling, with implications for public safety as a whole. He was arrested for “disorderly conduct” on his own property in Cambridge, MA last Thursday after police came to investigate a break in. The break in was actually a door jam that the Professor himself was eventually able to work-out. When the police arrived, though the story does not state this directly, it’s clear that they did not believe he was the owner of the house.
Dr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr.
While the police were busy endangering Dr. Gate’s safety by harassing and then arresting him, what crimes were committed elsewhere in the area? (Other than the arresting officer’s crime).
I lived and worked for nearly two years in Lahore, Pakistan, a city whose people and culture I fell in love with. The most common question I am asked about my time there is: “Did you feel safe?” This question misses an aspect of Lahori society that is unfortunately prevalent in the US- different levels of safety for different people based on status. In Lahore, this does relate to skin color and ethnic heritage, although the dynamics are much different than they are in the US.
To answer the question, I was afforded much more protection than the average Lahori, so no, I did not feel unsafe. I was not, like the 5,6, and 7 year olds I saw, dogding cars, trucks, moto-rickshaws and bicycles while standing in the middle of busy intersections at 11pm each night selling eggs to pay my way through elementary school.
Here in the US, some of my closest relatives will not go into urban areas because they feel they’re unsafe. Not only is this a coded, unconscious way of saying “poor people are not safe; Black people, Latino people…are not safe”, but it is inaccurate. Because of racial profiling and unequal sentencing laws (I’m guessing), white people in those poor neighborhoods where residents are predominantly people of color are less likely to encounter violence than people of color. (The fear people have that prevents them from going into these areas also keeps the numbers down, I’m sure, but that’s not the whole story).
Meanwhile, however, while we know that segregation and a variety of other factors has meant that many poor neighborhoods, some predominantly of color, are plagued by violence. (Look at Newark, New Jersey, where just yesterday, 3 shootings killed 3 and wounded 7.) That violence is, of course, hurting the residents who live there more than anyone else. Yet the outcry is less when Black bodies move from streets to caskets, and I have yet to see a nationwide missing person search for a Black woman.
So what do we do? How do we acknowledge this failure of public safety and then act to change it? Well, for one, in our interactions, Crystal, I should hold my tongue anytime I perceive you as being “overly” cautious. And two, I can start monitoring my local police station, retrieving data about who is arrested and why, who of the local missing persons are looked for and who are not.
We just heard tales from our local ACLU of local police routinely using “failure to use turning signal” infractions to stop and interrogate Latino drivers outside a Latino market when traffic stops are supposed to be selected at random so as not to target one demographic over another. Again, what crimes are committed and who is made more vulnerable when our limited law enforcement resources are sqaundered in this way?
I know police officers have a tough job, are overworked and underpaid, and I don’t mean to dehumanize them just as I ask that they not dehumanize large swathes of the citizenry. But clearly, they and we (especially us white people who are navigating a world that invests more in keeping us safe) must do better.
As I find the data to back up some of the factual claims here, I will input links to the research. If anyone has data about trends in racial profiling and whether it’s gotten better or worse since Clinton’s effort to combat it, please share.
Julia
