Due to the ever-changing whims of my (in)famous professor, my Composition II class has just been assigned a topic for our first term paper. And what sort of topic did my professor provide? Why! If my dear readers simply directed their gaze to the title of this post, they would see it for themselves. Yes. I am going there. Violence by police against citizens. Sigh... Let's just get this over with.
After the incidents with Michael Brown and another fine gentleman (whose name currently escapes me) that was strangled to death after being put into a chokehold by New York City police officers, the issue of violence committed by our "boys in uniform" has gained a staggering amount of attention in the media (both news and social). Simply put, these two unarmed African American men were killed by police officers who considered them suspicious enough to warrant a confrontation. Michael Brown was gunned down while the other man was suffocated. The ensuing riots in Ferguson and New York also caught the attention of the media from various angles. Conservitive media outlets supported the shootings, condemned the riots and discarded any notion that the deaths were racially motivated. Liberal media outlets did the exact opposite. Other news sources were bewildered on what stance to take as the controversy escalated.
In my own experience, I've continuously seen even more reports on deaths by police against unarmed citizens--thanks, in part, to my left-wing activist friends--on my Facebook account and the numbers of unreported killings is quite astounding. And frankly, I find it sickening.
Much of this controversy stems from the fact that the victims of these attacks were African-American men; leading to speculation of police racism as a motivating factor. I find myself in agreement with this. It's been common knowledge for years before the controversy started that the black community generally feared local and state police out of an assumption that the police specifically targeted them. As a caucasian male from the suburbs, I didn't think much of it all those years before, but in light of the recent attacks, I can see that race just might be an influence.
Even more so, the number of killings that have not exploded on the media is just as frightening. While I cannot remember specifics about any particular outside attack, I am appalled by this. I am also appalled with the fact that most cops get away with killing unarmed civilians. After all, grand juries tend not to indict officers, as history has proven. To the uninformed citizen--a category I am somewhat part of--it would appear that cops operate on a different level of the judicial system than average civilians. This is made even more shocking since the slaying unarmedman killed in New York was captured on video tape and the officers responsible still were not indicted. That's a horrifying scenario.
As I drive down major streets and see sherriffs and so on driving past me, I become frightened, not only of being pulled over, but also, of being assaulted should I get pulled over and say one thing out of line, unintentionally. Certainly, this is not a good sign of the times.
In the end, as much as I like the prospect of being saved by the police should my house get broken into--Goddess Forbid!--I also despise the idea that my own life could be endangered by those same people should I be in the wrong situation. Sure, I am not involved in any kind of crime at the moment, but misunderstandings happen all the time (as I have seen on true crime television shows like Forensic Files), and that always worries me.
Blessed be.
Christopher
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