The Racist America

As George Zimmerman is finally charged for his vigilante killing of the young black male, Tayvron Martin, the subject of race once again rears its ugly head for discussion. Right wingers have rallied around Zimmerman as an example of a man using his constitutional right to bear arms and protect himself against the threat of a hooded black teenager walking in a gated community almost exclusively populated by whites. The irony is Zimmerman has a Hispanic mother and in most racist quarters would be considered one of "them".
The special prosecutor in the Martin case claims the Sanford, Florida police were still in the initial investigation of this shooting 45 days after the killing. She claims her charges against Zimmerman are based only on fact and not influenced by community activists or pressure from outside. She has yet to admit the killing had some racial profiling involved. To do that would be to admit we have a race problem in America.
Meanwhile in White Plains, New York a combat veteran of the Marines was killed by the police after his medical alert device accidentally triggered an alarm. Kenneth Chamberlain, in his 60s, was black. He struggled with health problems resulting in him having the medical alert device that sent a signal to a private security firm calling for medical assistance.
On the night Chamberlain was killed, the private security firm apparently asked police to do a welfare check. But before the police arrived it was determined the alert was a false alarm. The security informed the police of the false alarm. The police persisted, however. The were determined to do the welfare check despite the information.
The White Plains police arrived at Chamberlain's door and repeatedly banged on it to ask he open up so they could be assured everything was alright. Chamberlain insisted he was not in danger and asked the cops to leave him alone. His insistence on exercising his rights incensed the police. They demanded he open the door. Apparently three cops were needed to handle the situation of the 68 year old ex-Marine's refusal to open his door because the cops demanded he do so.
Once the police did force themselves inside Chamberlain's residence, one cop decided he would activate his taser just in case. When Chamberlain argued with the cops about the need for them to be inside his home apparently he was seen as being belligerent and a possible danger to three healthy cops. So they tasered him even though he pleaded with them not to harm him and to leave him alone.
When the taser proved ineffective and Mr. Chamberlain was still able to exercise his rights against the ruthless police actions, the cops claim he threatened them with a hatchet. Despite having been tasered and having severe health problems. One of the cops was heard to call Mr. Chamberlain a nigger. This came out when the family attorney for Kenneth Chamberlain discovered the taser had a camera activated to record the police actions.
The recording also showed Chamberlain begged to be left alone and finally lamented he was going to be killed that night by the police. And he was right. Months after the killing of Kenneth Chamberlain there has been no punishment of the police officers who bullied him and eventually killed him. Internal investigation for White Plains police resided inside the squad room of the cops being sent out on the streets. There was no separation of the investigatory branch of the police from the beat cops. They shared the same space, the same camaraderie and the same blue line of silence whenever another cop brutalized a citizen.
Only now has there been further investigation of the death of a black combat veteran with severe enough health problems he required a medical alert device for possible rescue. And it was the community prompting the police to reopen an investigation not internal affairs or a district attorney.
These racist attacks occur on a routine basis with far greater frequency than the greatest majority of Americans could imagine. A young man using a hoodie to protect himself against the elements is viewed as a threat to a vigilante community watch member. He also used the word nigger during his conversation with the 911 operator. But he was given a pass by cops under the "stand your ground" laws allowing citizens the right to bear arms and use deadly force if they felt threatened or in imminent danger toward their life. As the NRA continually tells us, "guns don't kill people, people kill people". And the racial profiling of young and old black men is stark testimony to that NRA pet phrase.
A few years back I spent some time in the Denver City Jail after a conviction of trespassing at a Halliburton office as an act of non-violent civil disobedience. Halliburton was and still is one of DOD's biggest private contractors. My cell mate in the jail was a young black male in his 20s. He had dreadlocks and appeared to possibly be someone police would profile as being in a gang.
The first few hours in the cell were a period of silence between us. I was a fifty something white male in a jail cell with a hip hop 20 something black male. All the stereotypical thinking took place by both of us it turns out. Eventually I asked him or he asked me what caused our incarceration. He was in jail because he didn't have the money to pay a traffic fine which had accumulated when he'd put off meeting the due date for payment. He was facing 30 days in the county jail. His stay in city jail was only temporary until a "bed" opened at the over crowded county jail.
When I told him I was in jail after a conviction for a non violent civil disobedience against the war in Iraq, he opened up to me. He told me he respected what we in the peace movement were doing. As the hours dragged on we held a non-stop conversation. I discovered he was a college grad who was working on establishing a recording studio for hip hop artists in the Denver area. He was married and had a child on the way. His degree was in business which he wanted in order to go into his own business.
He also told me about the constant police harassment he faced as a young black male in Denver. Exacerbated by his dreadlock appearance. He lived in an area where gang activity occurred and anytime something gang related happened he was either pulled over while driving or stopped when walking.
I asked how often this rousting took place. He said it was sometimes daily but at least a few times each week. He said he had grown used to the harassment and avoided becoming angry or adversarial. He knew the reputation of DPD was one of brutality and racial profiling.
I told him about my experience in Vietnam as a combat infantryman. We eventually got around to discussing the "poverty draft" and high number of black troops both in Vietnam and Iraq and Afghanistan. He was an extremely intelligent and pleasant young man. My jail time seemed to be easy because of him.
What also impressed me was his ability to not only talk with me but he also interacted with other inmates in whatever jargon or level of communication they were at. This wasn't a guy without street wisdom. He was a victim of profiling.
In recent years I also became friends with another younger black male who was part of the International Action Committee. He also had dreadlocks. Larry is an organizer for IAC and has since moved back to the NYC area. During his stay in Denver he was also constantly harassed by DPD. On one occasion he was rousted simply because he looked "suspicious" entering his apartment building in a gentrified area of the Capitol Hill neighborhood. He was held up from entering his apartment for over a thirty minute time period while the police ran his name through their computer system for possible outstanding warrants and criminal record. And, of course, he had to produce some kind of proof he lived where he said he lived.
The most egregious episode of the harassment of Larry by the DPD came when he and his girlfriend, a young white activist woman, allowed a parolee to stay with them until he could afford his own housing. The parolee worked a night shift in an attempt to save money for the housing.
One evening after the parolee had left for work his parole officer and police woke Larry and Melissa up banging on their apartment door. When Larry, dressed in only underwear and without shoes on, answered the door he was pushed aside and told his apartment was subject to search since he was housing a parolee. They demanded to know where the parolee was. Then they began "tossing" the apartment looking for drugs and weapons. Larry objected and demanded the police identify themselves and respect his rights.
Larry exercising his legal rights and objecting to an unwarranted search was enough for the attending cops to throw him to the floor face first and sit on his back as they cuffed him. The only resistance was him verbalizing objections to the police and parole officer violating his rights. Meanwhile, Melissa was told to sit down and shut up while the search proceeded. Melissa asked if she could put her kitten in a closed room so it wouldn't run out the open exterior door to the apartment. When she rose to do so, she too was thrown to the ground.
Larry was dragged down the stairs of his apartment building out into the winter night. He was bare-footed and dressed only in his underwear. When he kept objecting and asked to be able to dress for the weather a cop butt ended him with a night stick and made a racial slur toward him. Larry was transported to the city jail in a paddy wagon full of other arrestees. One was kind enough to offer him a sweatshirt to help with his near hypothermia state. He was processed through jail and put in a cell charged with attempted assault on a police officer. This is usually the charge when a case of police brutality  occurs in Denver. They beat the victim and charge them for an attempted act of violence.
Larry was bailed out of jail after many hours in a cell. He was bruised and battered from the beating by police. Melissa wasn't arrested but she was also injured during the unnecessary take-down by police. And her cat ran away.
A call went out to organize a protest at city jail for this arrest. A small group of us turned out. Most were members of the black community. A friend of Larry who happened to be Muslim spoke out against the brutality. He, too, had experienced police brutality when attempting to speak at a university regents meeting that was said to be an open meeting.
Eventually all charges were dropped against Larry. But there was never an apology. The cops responsible for the brutality weren't disciplined. And to be truthful, Larry's experience with Denver's police was mild compared to many high profile cases of brutality against people of color.
In the late 60s and early 70s I was an organizer for VVAW. I had a veteran friend who worked the Black Panther breakfast program in the Five Points neighborhood. He was also a member of VVAW. He had lost a foot and lower leg by amputation following a wound incurred in combat in Vietnam. Butch was harassed, beaten and terrorized by Denver police almost weekly because of his activism in the Black Panther Party and VVAW.
Butch was as gentle a soul as I've ever met. He and his wife Penny had beautiful kids and attempted to live in peace and bring necessary changes to their community. They were seldom allowed peace. Not only was Butch terrorized but so was his family by late night "raids" of cops trying to find drugs and weapons.
When I had just returned from Vietnam I was walking in the Capitol Hill neighborhood with another veteran. We were talking with one another when we heard a man's cries coming from a nearby alley. We ran to the alley and saw a black male being beaten by two white cops. They were using their long and heavy flashlights to repeatedly strike the man in the gut and across his cheek. My friend and I ran up to the scene demanding the cops stop beating the already cuffed and subdued man. One of the cops pulled his pistol from the holster aiming it at us. He threatened to shoot us if we didn't leave. Both of us were combat veterans. We stood our ground for a minute to ask for the cops' names and badge numbers. The cop with the gun made his threat again telling us the bullet he shot us with would have his badge number on it. We moved on.
The next day we went to the HQ of DPD to file a complaint. We were made to wait over an hour and treated like we were suspects of a crime. Finally we were handed complaint forms without instructions by the cop on what information was necessary. We wrote our complaints but refused to put our names and addresses. We knew we could become victims ourselves giving out personal information.
Police intimidation, fear tactics, racial profiling, brutality. This is nothing new. And yet we continue to ignore it or endorse it as a way to have a peaceful society. We look the other way. We allow kids like Tayvron Martin to be killed before we speak up in large numbers. We deny racism but right at this time there is a bumper sticker being circulated that says it is a reality and getting worse. The message on the bumper sticker- "Don't re-nig in 2012" and the Obama hope symbol from 2008 is present with a slash through the round symbol.
And still we refuse to hold the discussion. We tolerate code words of overt racism. We tolerate actions by radical groups against blacks and other people of color. We tolerate the hate. The violence. We tolerate the criminalization of young men of color for possession of small amounts of drugs. We use the war on drugs to control the so-called "savages" or "mud people". We flooded neighborhoods in urban areas populated with black activists with CIA bought drugs to control the dissent. We discharge black veterans and veterans of color with less than honorable discharges in far greater proportion than white soldiers. We use 'em and lose 'em.
You'd have to be either stupid or stupidly naive to think this nation doesn't have a race problem. The election of a black President who has been as white as any other President in his interactions with big business has demonstrated the hatred simmering just below the surface of most of our nation. The white racists carrying monkeys with Obama's name on them is a vivid reminder of the hate. The total blockade of any proposal by the conservative right wing forces of Congress is a vivid reminder of the hate. No President in our history has ever faced a 100% filibuster in the Senate for every bill brought to a vote. Every bill required at least 60 votes of the 100 in the Senate.
The McConnells and Boehners of Congress can hardly withhold their hatred and racism whenever they speak in public. Watching them is like watching a secretive Klan meeting with the white robes missing. The Tea Party denies their racist intent but continually demonstrate it by their actions. Karl Rove thrives on racism and hate mongering to secure power for the right wing but even he has lamented things might have gone too far.
I could fill my blog with anecdotes about American racism, white police brutality and the hate. Arizona and other border states are forming citizen posse groups to go after perceived "illegals" entering the sacred borders of America. Most of the posse members are descendants of refugees and citizens of other nations seeking citizenship because of the better conditions in which a family might thrive. The irony doesn't faze them.
We continue to have reservations for the true indigenous people of North America. They live in squalor, without hope and resemble communities more like present day Haiti than America. The mentally defected, the impoverished and the openly gay join the communities of color in being disenfranchised. We are haters. Our churches don't promote the powerful message of tolerance and love Christ espoused. They promote hate toward those who don't meet their standards. Christ didn't have standards of who could follow his message. The churches claiming his name certainly do.
The most vivid example of hatred and racism by the Christian church has been the wars against the Asian commies of Vietnam ....godless, of course....and the crusades against the Islamofascists in Iraq and Afghanistan. The churches of Christ hate the Muslims of the world and hide behind the phony veneer of Christian do gooding. The NGOs of the churches aren't only attempting to bring relief to the most impoverished and in need around this globe. They are attempting to "rescue" the souls of those who believe in the "false gods" of the non-Christian churches. Racism is hate and we have plenty of hate in this nation. The faux world of America presented by white controlled media is constantly being exposed by the hate that is so poorly covered up.
Until the American people have a mature conversation about racism the problem won't go away. Right now calling a racist out for what they are will elicit a response of accusations about class warfare. Class warfare is when the rich white folks along with a few token non-whites gain over 274 % in their yearly income over a period of ten years while the other 90+ % of the population has only gained 8% in their yearly income over the same time period. Class warfare is when the same working class people increase their work production by 80% during that same time frame and they don't even receive an income increase that keeps up with increasing prices of the most essential items such as food.
Racism is a component of the larger problem of the haves and have-nots. The 99% versus the 1%. The race baiters like to keep the 99% polarized against each other to divert attention away from their corrupt theft of the global wealth. Vilify immigrants and people of color. Create homophobia at every turn. Make women killers of babies and sluts. Use misogynistic pornography and advertising to objectify females. Treat sexual issues with the maturity of preadolescence. Keeping people of color derided as inferior maintains the polarization and keeps us all fighting amongst ourselves. And not watching as our resources are stolen, our environment raped and our lives indentured. We are surely a racist nation but we are far beyond just that.