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    Hands Up: Why I Won't Be Marching

    Tezcatlipoca
    Tezcatlipoca
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    Hands Up: Why I Won't Be Marching Empty Hands Up: Why I Won't Be Marching

    Post  Tezcatlipoca Sat Jan 03, 2015 3:54 am

    Christopher Priest is one of only three or so bloggers I regularly check in on. I'm always interested in what he has to say on race relations in America, specifically as it relates to contemporary black culture. Here is a meditation on why he will not be marching in honor of the late Mike Brown.


    Priest wrote:Michael Brown was a thug. He was. I spent most of my childhood and adolescence running from thugs like Michael Brown. Brown was not Trayvon Martin, not minding his own business and murdered by a vigilante. He committed some petty shoplifting but, worse, threatened and intimidated the store clerk. Does that mean he deserved to be killed? Of course not. But it infuriates me that Black America continues to minimize our case for actual racial discrimination over these inflated events.

    When am I going to hear Michael’s father confess that something went wrong in his son’s life? Do we actually believe that was the first time Michael not only stole something, not only boldly walked out, but turned and walked back in, aggressively threatening the shopkeeper? Am I supposed to believe that was the first and only time Michael did that? Look at the video, how practiced that move was: Michael using his size to intimidate. I’ve seen that move. I’ve been on the receiving end of that move. That’s what bullies do. I’ve seen this kid before; I’ve run from this kid, this kid made my life a living hell.

    I assure you, there are kids, somewhere in that neighborhood, who are afraid to tell anybody that Michael intimidated them, that he beat them or threatened them. He was a scary guy.

    Officer Wilson was likely scared, too. He’d been attacked, he’d shot this boy, and yet the boy was now coming after him. Did he have his hands up or was he charging the cop? I don’t know. I do know, had Brown not robbed the store in the first place, I wouldn’t be writing this.

    I believe the officer panicked. I believe it was a bad call. But just the fact the officer panicked is enough to qualify him for a pass: if he feared for his life, he was permitted to use lethal force. And that rule, The Coward Defense, is the real problem: far too many sworn officers are just freaking cowards, far too many sworn officers are scared of black people and consider blacks more hostile than whites. Why? Because we are.

    That's the real problem, everything else is theater. This is not a problem that can be fixed on the street by yelling at cops who had nothing whatsoever to do with this mess. This is a problem than can only be addressed by the courts and by the ballot box, two avenues the black community routinely take for granted, preferring instead to shoulder no responsibility for these tragedies whatsoever but to suit up and threaten violence; thus reinforcing the very stereotype that fuels these tragic incidents.

    http://lamerciepark.com/lp/id14/141208/hands/

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