On Sunday, 60 Minutes ran a story about the increasing numbers of murders and shootings in Chicago.
Is this a surprise? Not really.
All throughout the Presidential campaign we heard references made to Chicago and we heard that overall crime had gone down in the country but the funny thing about crime is it hasn’t gone down if you are one of the victims of it. Chicago though is an interesting situation in that it underscores a false narrative that we’ve been fed over the last few years...
You might remember the Michael Brown shooting and how it sparked outrage even though it was later proven that Brown did indeed struggle with the officer in question and never uttered the words ‘don’t shoot!’ after the officer he encountered told him ‘hands up.’
For months though we were regaled to demonstrations were people chanted those words, ‘hands up, don’t shoot!’ It became the chorus that exemplified Police racism and brutality in our country. Admittedly, I watched all of this through skeptical eyes but the problem is that it is such an emotionally charged issue you run the risk of being called a racist if you are a white person who doesn’t buy into the narrative.
I don’t buy into that narrative so I imagine that makes me a racist, right?
I would beg to differ.
I can’t say I grew up well to do. As a matter of fact, I grew up so poor that dirt was rich compared to our household. You may think I’m exaggerating but I’m really not. I grew up in a single parent household where the custodial parent hadn’t graduated high school and worked as a chambermaid and the other parent in question would best be described as a deadbeat dad. This was at a time before we had all these wonderful terms for these things but I can tell you the people I grew up around were people of color. My best friend when I was around 10 was ‘Junebug’ and my other friends were Juan and his brother Carlos so I can’t say we were in the lily white country club crowd.
Being poor though means you live in for lack of a more delicate way to put it, a shitty neighborhood. A shitty neighborhood in the sense that you are much more likely to be a victim of crime or violence than someone who lives in a nice neighborhood.
Now, that doesn’t mean that crime doesn’t happen in nice neighborhoods but the truth of the matter is that the crime that does happen in nicer neighborhoods isn’t the same kind of crime that happens in poorer neighborhoods. Poorer neighborhoods are more subject to robbery, burglary, assault and rape than nicer (read higher income neighborhoods), is that racist or just an admission of economics and what drives some crime?
Anyway, let’s get back to that 60 minutes story on Chicago...
One of the things that Bill Whitaker noted was a less aggressive stance by the Police in Chicago and an explosion in violence that apparently resulted from that less aggressive stance.
Can we really be surprised by this?
Over the last year, every time someone of color has been shot and killed by a Police Officer, the first response has been this is just another instance of institutional bias on the part of Police - this has happened even when the officer involved in the shooting has been Black himself. There has been a rush to judgment, an assumption on the part of the media and the public that the officer is wrong and always this has happened without the full details and scope of the incident coming to light.
Is it any wonder the Police in Chicago don’t see much good in being aggressive in Policing? They have been put in a position where they are likely going to be called fascists or racists, so is there an upside for them?
I have known a few Cops over the course of my life and came close to being one myself at one point (hey, a good civil service job with decent benefits was always appealing to people in my economic class). It’s not an easy job. As a matter of fact it’s a pretty crappy job a lot of the time. Think about it for a second, if you get stopped by the Police, you’re generally not happy and if you’re a victim and the Police show up afterward aside from comfort and making sure you receive Medical attention what can they do?
A lot of policing, really at least when it comes to street crime which is prevalent in poorer neighborhoods is most effective as a preventive measure. A preventive measure being a Police presence and a feeling among vertain elements of the neighborhood that the Police are watching them.
Stop and Frisk was a program that was started with that in mind, the idea being in combination with the strict gun laws of New York, if someone is stopped and found to have a concealed weapon on their person it’s one less gun on the street and the likelihood of one less shooting happening and maybe even one less criminal preying on honest people just trying to live their lives.
That was stopped though along with some other things they had done here in New York over the last two decades and wouldn’t you know it, there’s been a rise in certain kinds of crime and certain quality of life issues reverting back to the good ‘old’ days as a result.
The upshot here is that Police are not the enemy. Certainly they are not the enemy they’ve been made out to be over the last year, year and a half. I’m a bit surprised that for every BLM demonstration that has targeted the actions of Police, there has not been at least five times as many that target gangs and drugs.
I guess it’s easier to blame an outside force or presence than to blame the members of your own community. It’s a bit sad really.
I can admit to never being particularly happy when I was pulled over by the Police. Look, it’s not fun. I can tell you though that somewhere along the line one lesson I was taught stuck and that was to roll over like a puppy when the Police stop you. I do everything by the book, it’s all about ‘Yes Officer.’ ‘No Sir’ etc. There isn’t any attitude whatsoever because I know I want this to be as painless as I can make and lip or attitude is going to take things in a direction that likely will have me on the short end of the stick.
Also, there was a period in my life when I sported a full beard and mustache and had a good mane of hair and a ponytail. You know what? I don’t think I ever got pulled over as much as I did when I looked like that before or since.
Appearances count.
It would be nice if that wasn’t the case but that’s a bit how the world works.
So. I am really not sure how to get out of the corner we appear to have painted ourselves into.
Rudy Guiliani was called a fascist (Mussolini) by his detractors because of his very aggressive approach to community policing (and I am avoiding just how offensive it was that as an Italian this kind of a slur could be made without anyone batting an eye) but the truth of it is the people he helped the most were the people in the poorest neighborhoods because they were safer as a result.
Rahm Emanuel is mayor of Chicago, he’s the former Chief of Staff of President Obama and you know, it’s pretty obvious he is in agreement with the outgoing President’s view of Police. It’s one of the things that really bothered me about President Obama but the sad thing is those neighborhoods are more dangerous, more Police have been gunned down than in the last five years and the real problem has yet to be addressed in these communities.
It’s what would best be described as abject failure.
Is this a surprise? Not really.
All throughout the Presidential campaign we heard references made to Chicago and we heard that overall crime had gone down in the country but the funny thing about crime is it hasn’t gone down if you are one of the victims of it. Chicago though is an interesting situation in that it underscores a false narrative that we’ve been fed over the last few years...
You might remember the Michael Brown shooting and how it sparked outrage even though it was later proven that Brown did indeed struggle with the officer in question and never uttered the words ‘don’t shoot!’ after the officer he encountered told him ‘hands up.’
For months though we were regaled to demonstrations were people chanted those words, ‘hands up, don’t shoot!’ It became the chorus that exemplified Police racism and brutality in our country. Admittedly, I watched all of this through skeptical eyes but the problem is that it is such an emotionally charged issue you run the risk of being called a racist if you are a white person who doesn’t buy into the narrative.
I don’t buy into that narrative so I imagine that makes me a racist, right?
I would beg to differ.
I can’t say I grew up well to do. As a matter of fact, I grew up so poor that dirt was rich compared to our household. You may think I’m exaggerating but I’m really not. I grew up in a single parent household where the custodial parent hadn’t graduated high school and worked as a chambermaid and the other parent in question would best be described as a deadbeat dad. This was at a time before we had all these wonderful terms for these things but I can tell you the people I grew up around were people of color. My best friend when I was around 10 was ‘Junebug’ and my other friends were Juan and his brother Carlos so I can’t say we were in the lily white country club crowd.
Being poor though means you live in for lack of a more delicate way to put it, a shitty neighborhood. A shitty neighborhood in the sense that you are much more likely to be a victim of crime or violence than someone who lives in a nice neighborhood.
Now, that doesn’t mean that crime doesn’t happen in nice neighborhoods but the truth of the matter is that the crime that does happen in nicer neighborhoods isn’t the same kind of crime that happens in poorer neighborhoods. Poorer neighborhoods are more subject to robbery, burglary, assault and rape than nicer (read higher income neighborhoods), is that racist or just an admission of economics and what drives some crime?
Anyway, let’s get back to that 60 minutes story on Chicago...
One of the things that Bill Whitaker noted was a less aggressive stance by the Police in Chicago and an explosion in violence that apparently resulted from that less aggressive stance.
Can we really be surprised by this?
Over the last year, every time someone of color has been shot and killed by a Police Officer, the first response has been this is just another instance of institutional bias on the part of Police - this has happened even when the officer involved in the shooting has been Black himself. There has been a rush to judgment, an assumption on the part of the media and the public that the officer is wrong and always this has happened without the full details and scope of the incident coming to light.
Is it any wonder the Police in Chicago don’t see much good in being aggressive in Policing? They have been put in a position where they are likely going to be called fascists or racists, so is there an upside for them?
I have known a few Cops over the course of my life and came close to being one myself at one point (hey, a good civil service job with decent benefits was always appealing to people in my economic class). It’s not an easy job. As a matter of fact it’s a pretty crappy job a lot of the time. Think about it for a second, if you get stopped by the Police, you’re generally not happy and if you’re a victim and the Police show up afterward aside from comfort and making sure you receive Medical attention what can they do?
A lot of policing, really at least when it comes to street crime which is prevalent in poorer neighborhoods is most effective as a preventive measure. A preventive measure being a Police presence and a feeling among vertain elements of the neighborhood that the Police are watching them.
Stop and Frisk was a program that was started with that in mind, the idea being in combination with the strict gun laws of New York, if someone is stopped and found to have a concealed weapon on their person it’s one less gun on the street and the likelihood of one less shooting happening and maybe even one less criminal preying on honest people just trying to live their lives.
That was stopped though along with some other things they had done here in New York over the last two decades and wouldn’t you know it, there’s been a rise in certain kinds of crime and certain quality of life issues reverting back to the good ‘old’ days as a result.
The upshot here is that Police are not the enemy. Certainly they are not the enemy they’ve been made out to be over the last year, year and a half. I’m a bit surprised that for every BLM demonstration that has targeted the actions of Police, there has not been at least five times as many that target gangs and drugs.
I guess it’s easier to blame an outside force or presence than to blame the members of your own community. It’s a bit sad really.
I can admit to never being particularly happy when I was pulled over by the Police. Look, it’s not fun. I can tell you though that somewhere along the line one lesson I was taught stuck and that was to roll over like a puppy when the Police stop you. I do everything by the book, it’s all about ‘Yes Officer.’ ‘No Sir’ etc. There isn’t any attitude whatsoever because I know I want this to be as painless as I can make and lip or attitude is going to take things in a direction that likely will have me on the short end of the stick.
Also, there was a period in my life when I sported a full beard and mustache and had a good mane of hair and a ponytail. You know what? I don’t think I ever got pulled over as much as I did when I looked like that before or since.
Appearances count.
It would be nice if that wasn’t the case but that’s a bit how the world works.
So. I am really not sure how to get out of the corner we appear to have painted ourselves into.
Rudy Guiliani was called a fascist (Mussolini) by his detractors because of his very aggressive approach to community policing (and I am avoiding just how offensive it was that as an Italian this kind of a slur could be made without anyone batting an eye) but the truth of it is the people he helped the most were the people in the poorest neighborhoods because they were safer as a result.
Rahm Emanuel is mayor of Chicago, he’s the former Chief of Staff of President Obama and you know, it’s pretty obvious he is in agreement with the outgoing President’s view of Police. It’s one of the things that really bothered me about President Obama but the sad thing is those neighborhoods are more dangerous, more Police have been gunned down than in the last five years and the real problem has yet to be addressed in these communities.
It’s what would best be described as abject failure.
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