What really triggered police misconduct at a pool party in McKinney, Texas

Reblogged from The Secular Jurist:

By Robert A. Vella

By now, you’ve probably heard about the incident in McKinney, Texas where police officer Eric Casebolt – who has since resigned (see:  Police officer who slammed black girl to the ground at McKinney, Texas, pool party resigns) – went ballistic on a group of black teenagers attending a pool party.  Understandably, it has reignited the ongoing national debate over race relations in America where actual and potential victims of police misconduct see all cops as racists and where white conservatives see all black people as criminals.

However, what really triggered this incident appears to have less to do with either predisposition and more to do with how police respond to citizen reports of “criminal” behavior.

From Terrance Heath of Campaign for America’s Future – Police Violence Against Blacks Has An Economic Context:

A similar economic backdrop exists in McKinney, Texas, where another incident of excessive use of force this weekend led to more headlines and protests. African-American residents of the Craig Ranch neighborhood, a gated planned community in McKinney, held an end-of-the-school-year party at the community swimming pool, attended by a racially mixed group of teenagers, most of whom lived in Craig Ranch. Residents complained that the teenagers were too rowdy. The organizer of the party said that a security guard appeared and began asking the black teenagers if they had pool cards, and insisting the black teenagers leave.

Witnesses agree that the situation escalated when a white adult resident told the African-American teenagers to “go back to section 8 housing,” got into an argument with, and slapped the African-American teenager who organized the party.

McKinney, Texas — which Money magazine ranked last year as the best place to live in America — has a long history of housing discrimination. The city is split by Highway 75. The wealthier section of McKinney (where the Craig Ranch community is) lies west of Highway 75 and is 86 percent white. The older, poorer section of town sits east of the highway, and is 49 percent white.

In 2009, McKinney settled a large housing discrimination lawsuit, alleging that the city was blocking the development of affordable housing for tenants with Section 8 vouchers, in the whiter, more affluent west side of the city. But a court settlement doesn’t mean the issue of housing discrimination is settled, as the reported comment about Section 8 housing indicate. The white resident alleged to have made this comment obviously associated African Americans with what she considered slum housing.

Another reported comment that the black teenagers should get used to the bars outside the pool because “that’s all they were going to see,” reflects assumptions many people make about young blacks.

Just because some racist, segregationist white people don’t like seeing blacks in their gated community, isn’t sufficient cause for police to blindly obey their perverse desires and engage in some sort of American-style ethnic cleansing.  Before taking any action, the police should have thoroughly investigated the situation and, even if laws were indeed broken, resolved the matter peacefully.  From what I’ve been able to determine, the only crimes which might have been committed are misdemeanor trespassing (by the teenagers) and misdemeanor assault & battery (by the residents) – neither of which warranted the type of police response exhibited by officer Casebolt.

The failure here, and evidenced throughout the nation, falls squarely upon law enforcement administration.  Cops who are poorly trained in proper response techniques, or who cannot apply the law equally and without bias, are not qualified to be police officers and should be retrained or removed from duty.  Obviously, such professional managerial oversight is severely lacking across America.

Further reading:

The only good news about the McKinney pool party is the white kids’ response to racism

Keeping black people away from white swimming pools is an American tradition

American Denial: a profound and revealing sociological study of Racism in America

By Robert A. Vella

Last night, PBS aired an Independent Lens documentary titled American Denial which examined a sociological study of racism in America begun in the 1930s.  It is the most profound and uncomfortably revealing work of journalism I’ve ever seen on the subject of race which I’m rating as MUST SEE for the readers of this blog.

Of particular note is its focus on the abject disparity between the conscious and subconscious attitudes of white Americans towards black people and other ethnic groups.  The documentary also exposes how this psychological phenomenon impacts cultural perceptions, expectations, and biases in America which affect all persons regardless of race and ethnicity.  Examples include doctors who treat people differently even though the patients suffer from the same condition, black children who choose white dolls as more “beautiful” and “good,” political dynamics which label poor blacks as “inferior,” and law enforcement practices which criminalize the very existence of black people in America.

American Denial also confronts racism more directly with segments showing how southern whites reacted to suggestions comparing Jim Crow laws (i.e. segregation) to the Nazi persecution of Jews in Europe, as well as to suggestions asserting that obsessive white fear of black sexuality concealed deeply-held and culturally taboo emotions.

From PBS – Independent Lens – American Denial:

Follow the story of Swedish researcher Gunnar Myrdal whose landmark 1944 study, An American Dilemma, probed deep into the United States’ racial psyche. The film weaves a narrative that exposes some of the potential underlying causes of racial biases still rooted in America’s systems and institutions today.

An intellectual social visionary who later won a Nobel Prize in economics, Myrdal first visited the Jim Crow South at the invitation of the Carnegie Corporation in 1938, where he was “shocked to the core by all the evils [he] saw.” With a team of scholars that included black political scientist Ralph Bunche, Myrdal wrote his massive 1,500-page investigation of race, now considered a classic.

An American Dilemma challenged the veracity of the American creed of equality, justice, and liberty for all. It argued that critically implicit in that creed — which Myrdal called America’s “state religion” — was a more shameful conflict: white Americans explained away the lack of opportunity for blacks by labeling them inferior. Myrdal argued that this view justified practices and policies that openly undermined and oppressed the lives of black citizens. Seventy years later, are we still a society living in this state of denial, in an era marked by the election of the nation’s first black president?

American Denial sheds light on the unconscious political and moral world of modern Americans, using archival footage, newsreels, nightly news reports, and rare southern home movies from the ‘30s and ‘40s, as well as research footage, websites, and YouTube films showing psychological testing of racial attitudes. Exploring “stop-and-frisk” practices, the incarceration crisis, and racially-patterned poverty, the film features a wide array of historians, psychologists, and sociologists who offer expert insight and share their own personal, unsettling stories. The result is a unique and provocative film that challenges our assumptions about who we are and what we really believe.

Watch the documentary here:  http://video.pbs.org/video/2365422025/

Caged no more

Looking into the Mirror of Racism

This essay is directed at White people.  I happen to be Caucasian, and it’s long past the time all of us need to look into the mirror about racism.  Most of us don’t think of ourselves as racists.  Most of us don’t entertain deliberate thoughts about race.  We are confident in our benevolence and wish no ill will towards others be they black, brown, or white.  Racism is something evil people do.  We are not evil.  America is no longer a racist country.  Those who still complain about it are either mistaken or are just trying to stir up trouble.  Right?

Recently, Colorado state senator Vicki Marble claimed that Black people are poor because they eat too much barbeque chicken.  She later apologized for her remarks if they had offended anyone, but she did not apologize for their obviously ignorant and insensitive content.  As a political representative of the people, her words carry much more weight than an ordinary citizen.  What she said was objectively racist even though subjectively she may not have thought so.

Colorado State Sen. Vicki Marble (R)
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These subtle and seemingly innocuous sentiments are the real faces of racism, and they happen countless times every day in America.  Their cumulative effect on society is pernicious, leading to an escalation and intensification of ethnic and racial animus.  Such cultural divisions pose an existential threat to the nation in terms of its security and prosperity.  The overt racism expressed by small groups like the KKK, Aryan Brotherhood, skinheads, and neo-Nazis, pales in comparison.

Now, let’s look into the mirror.

Have you ever made disparaging comments like Vicki Marble’s?  I know I have.

Have you ever heard your friends and family members say even worse things?  I know I have.

Have you ever been participant or witness to an ugly act of racial disrespect?  I know I have.

Have you ever turned your back on a person who was the target of such an act?  I know I have.

Have you ever allowed your innermost feelings to discriminate against someone who doesn’t look like you?  Be honest, now.  I know I have.

Have you ever rooted for or against an athlete or sports teams solely because of their race?  I know I have.

Have you ever observed a racially-motivated crime?  I know I have.

Have you ever ignored the racial transgressions of your associates?  I know I have.

Have you ever supported a person or organization despite their negative racial attitudes?  I have not.  If you have ever voted for a politician who favors voter suppression efforts through so-called “Voter Id” legislation, then you most certainly have supported racism.

On this day when we commemorate the 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech and the March on Washington, let all of us White folks pause for a moment of self-reflection and look closely into the mirror.  What do you see?