There's a chunk of a Washington Post article that I feel like I have to address, especially after some things I...
There's a chunk of a Washington Post article that I feel like I have to address, especially after some things I heard on TV. I cannot imagine that police in this country do not feel threatened right now, even the best ones. I would. However, if one of their spokespersons feels that stating uncomfortable facts is exploitation, that seems to me to be part of the problem.
It's awkward enough when people point out that you've unconsciously crossed the street to avoid an unknown person of color, or that a taxi stopped for you and avoided them, etc. But trying not to say uncomfortable things, and deeply embedding dangerous assumptions into the culture that are not even questioned got us to this place.
We voted, as a society, for the people who are passing laws that other and segregate and disenfranchise. We support, as a society, militarizing our police, and demonizing "those people", and using the police to keep them away. We vote for people who scare us and tell us we need weapons to "protect" ourselves, which means we are willing to kill other people of whom we are scared. Why are we scared of them? Etc., etc.
So it is important for one of those elected officials to say, essentially, we screwed up. We set this up and it came to its logical conclusion and we can't keep pretending otherwise. To me, that's not exploitation. Telling us we need guns because "those people" are a threat is exploitation.
Further, the Governor is just as much in a position to observe and comment on society as anyone, but he's also in a position of leadership. Leaders need to take on the things that they see as failings in our society, particularly when their role is leading that society. Of course race had something to do with it. We all have that same dialog running in our heads, on one side or the other.
I know it's taken as an accusation that the officer consciously thought, "I am going to shoot a black man." That's not it, at all. That would be so much easier to address, because it would be right out there. It's the crust under the cookie bar that you don't think about, but without it there wouldn't be a cookie bar. It's so ingrained we don't know we're thinking it, but it informs our reflexive actions.
If our information is correct, that officer saw a black man in an affluent white neighborhood, heard the word "gun", saw him move, and reflexively fired. Why? Why was he even so ready to fire? Why wasn't his first action to run behind the car, if he thought he was about to pull a gun? Why would he assume that a man with a child in the car would draw a gun? Etc., etc. What was so lacking in the officer's training and conditioning that his first reaction was to fire a gun?
And here's another newsflash. Racism exists in Minnesota. It exists everywhere. It's nice that some segments of society like to think they are all wonderful and gracious and liberal and so on, but sometimes people need to call us out and say, hey, it isn't all better. It didn't magically go away. There's still work that needs to be done, consciously and deliberately.
So no, it wasn't exploitation at all. It was a statement of opinion and it was a statement of fact. Pretending otherwise would not have prevented what happened in Dallas, because that was not just because of one thing.
Police feel threatened because we have failed as a society to demand and support an appropriate role for them. Because we have failed to demand that we behave rationally and appropriately and stop behaving in damaging ways ourselves. You know, what some people call being too PC. Apparently, it's easier to call everyone names and keep everyone separated and in fear of one another.
And it's tremendously beneficial - to the gun industry, to the prison industry, to the news industry. They all benefit by exploiting the worst aspects of our behavior as a society. But Governor Dayton's answer to a direct question? Not exploitation.
This is the quoted section of the article:
“Would this have happened if those passengers, the driver and the passengers, were white?” Dayton said. “I don’t think it would have. … I think all of us in Minnesota are forced to confront that this kind of racism exists.”
Johnson said the governor “exploited what was already a horrible and tragic situation.”
“Whether race had something to do with it or not, I don’t know, because I can’t get into the officer’s head,” Johnson told The Post. “And neither can the governor.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2016/07/07/minn-cop-fatally-shoots-man-during-traffic-stop-aftermath-broadcast-on-facebook/
It's awkward enough when people point out that you've unconsciously crossed the street to avoid an unknown person of color, or that a taxi stopped for you and avoided them, etc. But trying not to say uncomfortable things, and deeply embedding dangerous assumptions into the culture that are not even questioned got us to this place.
We voted, as a society, for the people who are passing laws that other and segregate and disenfranchise. We support, as a society, militarizing our police, and demonizing "those people", and using the police to keep them away. We vote for people who scare us and tell us we need weapons to "protect" ourselves, which means we are willing to kill other people of whom we are scared. Why are we scared of them? Etc., etc.
So it is important for one of those elected officials to say, essentially, we screwed up. We set this up and it came to its logical conclusion and we can't keep pretending otherwise. To me, that's not exploitation. Telling us we need guns because "those people" are a threat is exploitation.
Further, the Governor is just as much in a position to observe and comment on society as anyone, but he's also in a position of leadership. Leaders need to take on the things that they see as failings in our society, particularly when their role is leading that society. Of course race had something to do with it. We all have that same dialog running in our heads, on one side or the other.
I know it's taken as an accusation that the officer consciously thought, "I am going to shoot a black man." That's not it, at all. That would be so much easier to address, because it would be right out there. It's the crust under the cookie bar that you don't think about, but without it there wouldn't be a cookie bar. It's so ingrained we don't know we're thinking it, but it informs our reflexive actions.
If our information is correct, that officer saw a black man in an affluent white neighborhood, heard the word "gun", saw him move, and reflexively fired. Why? Why was he even so ready to fire? Why wasn't his first action to run behind the car, if he thought he was about to pull a gun? Why would he assume that a man with a child in the car would draw a gun? Etc., etc. What was so lacking in the officer's training and conditioning that his first reaction was to fire a gun?
And here's another newsflash. Racism exists in Minnesota. It exists everywhere. It's nice that some segments of society like to think they are all wonderful and gracious and liberal and so on, but sometimes people need to call us out and say, hey, it isn't all better. It didn't magically go away. There's still work that needs to be done, consciously and deliberately.
So no, it wasn't exploitation at all. It was a statement of opinion and it was a statement of fact. Pretending otherwise would not have prevented what happened in Dallas, because that was not just because of one thing.
Police feel threatened because we have failed as a society to demand and support an appropriate role for them. Because we have failed to demand that we behave rationally and appropriately and stop behaving in damaging ways ourselves. You know, what some people call being too PC. Apparently, it's easier to call everyone names and keep everyone separated and in fear of one another.
And it's tremendously beneficial - to the gun industry, to the prison industry, to the news industry. They all benefit by exploiting the worst aspects of our behavior as a society. But Governor Dayton's answer to a direct question? Not exploitation.
This is the quoted section of the article:
“Would this have happened if those passengers, the driver and the passengers, were white?” Dayton said. “I don’t think it would have. … I think all of us in Minnesota are forced to confront that this kind of racism exists.”
Johnson said the governor “exploited what was already a horrible and tragic situation.”
“Whether race had something to do with it or not, I don’t know, because I can’t get into the officer’s head,” Johnson told The Post. “And neither can the governor.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2016/07/07/minn-cop-fatally-shoots-man-during-traffic-stop-aftermath-broadcast-on-facebook/
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