I've been thinking about colonialism as endemic to New Mexico.
It's
part of Pueblo culture and other Native culture, too, including
Diné/Navajo.
I've been reading Lucy Lippard's magisterial "Down Country" (mostly) about the Tano people of the Galisteo Basin, just to the
north over a ridge from our own place in the Estancia Basin. The Tano came as
colonizers from the north and west in -- perhaps -- 1200AD or so;
there were already scattered settlements in the Galisteo, some a
thousand years old, perhaps (then again, maybe not so old.) The
inhabitants were overwhelmed, driven out or incorporated into the
new Tano pueblo villages, the ruins of which are found all over the
Galisteo. The Spanish, in their turn, overwhelmed the Tano pueblos,
and eventually, they were all abandoned, the remnant Tano people
moving to Hopi-land where their descendants still are.
The Spanish settled in after a while, and they in their turn were
overwhelmed and the Anglo colonists moved in. Galisteo itself has
been a Tano pueblo, a Spanish pueblo and it is now (mostly) an Anglo
artist colony, an offshoot of Santa Fe's art colony. Fancy people,
all 250 of them, in their fancy houses and studios, with their
fancy (non-functional) mailboxes, lording it over... well, their own
domain. A domain taken from others, who took it from others, who in
turn took it from others still.
I'm a colonist too. Ms Ché is in a slightly different category being
Native and all, but Cherokee are not the local indigenous even so.
Cherokee are more or less in charge of IAIA, and even though it is
Indian-centered and Indian run, IAIA is very much a colonial
enterprise.
Where we are, the Empty Quarter, has a similar pattern to that of
the Galisteo Basin, though much attenuated, as no one (much) lived
here to take the land from, and there were few resources easily
exploitable.
The closest pueblos were fifteen/twenty miles away. This was an open grassland where buffalo roamed. The deer and the antelope played in
the hills and mountains round about, among the cholla, pinon, and juniper. Before the Spanish, the Tompiro
people coming from the west established a few outposts which became
large pueblo trading centers, the chief product being salt which the
people collected from the salt ponds to the east, the remnants of
the once mighty lake that had filled the Estancia basin. The trade was
between the local pueblos, the pueblos along the Rio Grande on the
west side of the mountains, and the Plains tribes, chiefly the Kiowa
and Comanche who roamed and were fierce in their war paint wherever
and whenever they wished. They followed the buffalo, but so did the
Pueblo peoples whose hunts were legendary.
The Tompiro fought the Spanish and submitted to the Spanish and that
was their undoing, for once they sumitted, they no longer were able
to rely on their own customs and resources to ensure their survival,
they had to rely on the Spanish -- who literally had no concern for
the well-being/survival of the People, only for themselves.
Ultimately, the remnant Tompiro people (perhaps only a few hundred
by then) left en masse and joined the Rio Grande pueblos, chiefly
Isleta, just before the outbreak of the Pueblo Revolt.
They never came back. The land was empty -- except for the birds,
the buffalo, the deer and the antelope, the coyotes and the
occasional forays from the Kiowa and Comanche, who now had to scale
the mountain passes to get to the pueblos and the Spanish
settlements for slave-raiding and trade. Such an inconvenience, but
they managed somehow.
This land became part of contested and competing land grants and was
used primarily for sheep-raising when it was used at all. It was
wild-country, no-man's land.
There were a few Spanish villages along the east foothills of the
Manzanos and there was a ranch headquarters at Estancia, and that
was pretty much it for settlement. The ruins of the stone-built
pueblos did not dissolve back into the ground like adobe would but
still stood stark, rigid and crumbling, not unlike tiny versions of
Chaco and Mesa Verde.
Anglo colonists came from Texas with their multitudes of cattle and
claimed the land for their own, demanding that the sheep-ranchers
and their sheep withdraw forthwith. There was a notorious shoot-out
after a friendly poker game. The colonists came from Texas, but the
Anglo colonial enterprise was directed from California, via Boston,
or vice versa. I had no idea until after I'd lived here for a while
that the cattle operation was owned by the Whitneys who had a vast
ranch and experimental farm outside of Sacramento which turned into
one of the many microchip suburbs and where I had worked from time
to time. The Whitneys came from Boston at the tail end of the Gold
Rush. In New Mexico, the Whitneys claimed to be from Boston, though
their entire expansion program was being run from their California
ranch. Colorado didn't escape their ministrations, either, I'm told,
but that's another tale for another time.
(I'm sure I've told this story before) The Whitneys fought the
Oteros on the ground and in court for decades for control of the
land, and finally they both lost at the Supreme Court, and the land
was opened for Anglo homesteading/settlement. The railroad promptly
laid tracks, and the remnants of history are all around, as are the
many ruins of broken dreams. Our house was one of those ruins until
we, colonists from California, "rescued" it and rehabbed it enough
to live in. With the skunks underneath and the song birds nesting in
the eaves.
Now and then, we still hear a coyote howl or see an eagle soar.
There are no buffalo, though, no more. I don't know why not. There
are vast ranches nearby where they could be raised and roam, ranches
that host numerous cattle, horses, llamas, or goats, and if they can
host any of those, they can host buffalo, but they don't. The
pronghorn, they say, are not the Native variety -- they were hunted
to extinction in historic times -- they are an imported variety from
Wyoming; colonists you might say, in their own right, like the
cattle, the horses, the llamas and the goats.
The Russian olives are colonists as are most of the plants that now
cover the grasslands. The farms and most of their crops are
colonists, though corn, beans and squash are raised in abundance and
are highly sought after by city-folk who flock to the country at
harvest time. Colonists. The farm nearby where the cranes roost in
the daytime is a working farm, but also an "attraction," hosting
thousands of school children bussed in from the city every year to
see what a "real farm" is like. Colonists.
All I'm saying is that there is no escaping colonialism in New
Mexico. Even the Diné/Navajo are colonists -- coming in from
the north so late in the game they were practically simultaneous
arrivals with the Spanish, within a hundred years or so. They were
raiders like their cousins the Apaches. The pueblo peoples feared
and despised them. Some still do. Colonists all.
The question is whether colonialism will continue to be imposed by
force and bloodshed. That's the issue of police violence in a
nutshell. That's the issue raised by so many of the Indians we've
come to know in New Mexico -- who say, almost to a one, "It didn't
have to be this way."
The violence was never necessary.
The taking and the stealing and the use of force and bloodshed
was never necessary. Matters could be worked out (relatively)
peacefully. Accommodations could be made. They still can be.
That's what I'm hoping to see happen in the next phase of opposition
to police violence -- and implicitly to the violence of
Anglo-colonialism.
The Spanish and the Indians learned -- the hard way -- to
accommodate one another in this harsh and unforgiving land. As I've
heard said, they're all related now, they're children of one
another's mothers, and though they may maintain distinctive
cultures, they are still family. They often unite to oppose more
Anglo colonial impositions and these days they can and do succeed in
their opposition.
The question is whether the Anglos will learn there is another way.
In my view, they must learn.
Wednesday, March 25, 2015
Sunday, March 22, 2015
People's Tribunal in Albuquerque
Last Sunday, ABQJustice conducted what they called a tribunal with regard to the long and disreputable record of the Albuquerque Police Department's racist and violent policing.
I wasn't able to attend, but I have seen the videos (Part I and Part II) of the event and I've read the report that formed the basis of this tribunal.
This wasn't really a tribunal as there was no means of adjudication and only certain testimony was allowed. There was no "other side" in other words. Thus there was no way to weigh the testimony and evidence. Further, the focus was not on racism and violence by APD, it was on historical resistance and utilized the indirect testimony from victims of APD's history of racism and police violence.
Nevertheless, I am a strong advocate for People's Tribunals and courts as a means of highlighting social problems and solutions, and of making a public case for change while holding those who commit public violence responsible to the public.
Such tribunals can be very dramatic and very effective -- at least as long as they stay focused on the issues they're organized to examine and they are able to render a judgement based on the evidence, including testimony, presented.
Unfortunately, that wasn't the case here. I can only speculate on the reasons why.
Part of the problem may be that APD's rate of killing has fallen dramatically since last July, when for all intents and purposes, the killer cops were told to stand down -- and to a degree I never anticipated, they did.
With the kill rate so surprisingly reduced, the point of the protests and actions against police violence in Albuquerque may have been lost, or there may be some other agenda in operation, one that sees the killings that triggered so much outrage in the spring and summer of last year as merely a starting point. I don't know.
At any rate, while the report on police racism and prejudice in Albuquerque is welcome, it lacks the kind of statistical basis and focus on police violence that I would like to see and that I think is necessary to catalyze real and lasting reform -- if reform is even possible and the desired outcome.
For example, if you're going to accuse the police of racist and prejudiced policing, it can help immeasurably to have and to show statistics that back it up. Unfortunately, the report lacks those statistics, though there is plenty of evocative testimony that suggests as much.
The objectives of the report are not entirely clear, although there is a list of desired "Expectations" which include:
What is most surprising to me is that they aren't based in concepts of racial and social justice. Instead they are aspects of information desired and the interests of those who developed the report.
Let's go one by one:
1. An independent agency to discipline officers and make policy.
As far as I know, no police department anywhere in the country has such a truly independent agency. The issue is "independence." How do you judge that? How to you ensure that? Police departments are the creations and creatures of civic authority, authority which is nominally vested in the elected representatives of the citizens, but which is actually almost always controlled and implemented by appointed officials, usually the City Manager or the equivalent. You can create a commission or review board or oversight agency, but the vexing problem is assuring its independence and authority outside the chain of command of the city's government. This is quite apart from the problems of oversight caused by police unions and their enforceable agreements. There is no "independence" in other words. Discipline has historically been a contractual matter, pursued internally; policy is ostensibly the purview of the elected representatives of the citizens, but policy recommendations are largely and implementation is entirely at the discretion of the City Manager and his/her delegates -- such as the police chief. If you want to change that, you have to change the whole structure of authority in city governments.
2. Routine extensive outreach to collect complaints against APD.
By whom? Police? Nonsense. The problem that is mentioned in the report is that those who might be making complaints of police abuse and misconduct are terrified of the police. Police, therefore, are not the appropriate civic authorities to do such outreach, but who is? Social service organizations? Perhaps. But the problem for most of them is that they are already overwhelmed and severely restricted in their abilities to perform services as it is. How are they to add further outreach to their responsibilities. And who would they report to? What would be done with these complaints? Would they go to a powerless quasi-independent agency to languish and eventually be dismissed -- as most complaints typically do? Or what?
3. The acceptance of anonymous complaints against APD.
That should be a no-brainer, but acceptance doesn't mean action.
4. The decriminalization of homelessness.
Homelessness per se is not a crime. Sleeping on the sidewalk or urinating in public may be crimes. The problems of homelessness are manifest, and the solutions are relatively obvious, but for whatever reason, policy makers largely refuse to employ them (ie: provide housing.) Using the criminal justice system (such as it is) to deal with homelessness is stupid. The issue isn't so much the criminalization of homelessness as it is a public policy of harassment and humiliation of the homeless, using the police and the so-called justice system to make already miserable lives worse.
5. Police officers who use unjustified force must be held criminally accountable.
Who decides what is "unjustified?" Again, the problem is lines of authority and where decision making lies. In theory, police are already held accountable for the use of unjustified force. The problem is that the police and district attorney in concert decide that (almost) all uses of force are "justified." The public may disagree, but the public has no control over the process and decision-making. There's no current mechanism to ensure that this expectation becomes operative.
6. The publishing of all officer shift rosters at the end of each week, and the immediate online posting of all lapel camera video.
The objective? The rosters should be available in real time, and there should be a secure (tamper-proof) lapel camera footage repository. In other words, camera footage should be uploaded as it is acquired rather than stored in the camera itself and uploaded at the discretion of the police. On the other hand, making all footage immediately available to the public seems counter productive.
7. The recruitment of officer candidates who hold degrees, or have experience, in, social work or allied fields.
While I understand why this could be desirable, I don't agree that police should be assigned to social work responsibility. This has been one of the major issues of hundreds of police involved shootings every year. Police are sent on calls that need social or medical worker intervention or services, with too often deadly results. Even when the police sent on these calls have special training and experience. The answer is to send social and medical workers, not police. But that means changing policies and protocols, and it means increasing the numbers of available non-police workers to go on such calls.
8. Limiting promotion to officers who have experience in, or show an inclination for, community-based policing.
Who will define the terms? "Community based policing" needs to be defined here. Then policies can be implemented and promotions made on the basis of those policies. Until then, this proposal is too vague to be useful.
If there had been a real tribunal last Sunday, there would have been charges presented against the city of Albuquerque and certain of its employees including the Mayor and the City Administrator and named police officers who have engaged in egregious or violent conduct.
A real tribunal would have then heard testimony from individuals who have been victims of police violence or other mistreatment and abuse, and the city authorities and police would have had an opportunity to present a defense either directly or by proxy.
Then the tribunal would have made a judgement and recommendations.
Instead, the report was presented as a fait accompli. The tribunal made no recommendations itself, nor did it render a judgement.
I like the tactic of a People's Tribunal, and I'd like to see it continued so as to make clear what the policing problems are and what to do about them... and to point out who is responsible.
This report and tribunal didn't quite do that.
I wasn't able to attend, but I have seen the videos (Part I and Part II) of the event and I've read the report that formed the basis of this tribunal.
This wasn't really a tribunal as there was no means of adjudication and only certain testimony was allowed. There was no "other side" in other words. Thus there was no way to weigh the testimony and evidence. Further, the focus was not on racism and violence by APD, it was on historical resistance and utilized the indirect testimony from victims of APD's history of racism and police violence.
Nevertheless, I am a strong advocate for People's Tribunals and courts as a means of highlighting social problems and solutions, and of making a public case for change while holding those who commit public violence responsible to the public.
Such tribunals can be very dramatic and very effective -- at least as long as they stay focused on the issues they're organized to examine and they are able to render a judgement based on the evidence, including testimony, presented.
Unfortunately, that wasn't the case here. I can only speculate on the reasons why.
Part of the problem may be that APD's rate of killing has fallen dramatically since last July, when for all intents and purposes, the killer cops were told to stand down -- and to a degree I never anticipated, they did.
With the kill rate so surprisingly reduced, the point of the protests and actions against police violence in Albuquerque may have been lost, or there may be some other agenda in operation, one that sees the killings that triggered so much outrage in the spring and summer of last year as merely a starting point. I don't know.
At any rate, while the report on police racism and prejudice in Albuquerque is welcome, it lacks the kind of statistical basis and focus on police violence that I would like to see and that I think is necessary to catalyze real and lasting reform -- if reform is even possible and the desired outcome.
For example, if you're going to accuse the police of racist and prejudiced policing, it can help immeasurably to have and to show statistics that back it up. Unfortunately, the report lacks those statistics, though there is plenty of evocative testimony that suggests as much.
The objectives of the report are not entirely clear, although there is a list of desired "Expectations" which include:
1. An independent agency with the authority to discipline officers and make policy changes.
2. Routine extensive outreach to collect complaints against APD.
3. The acceptance of anonymous complaints against APD.
4. The decriminalization of homelessness.
5. Police officers who use unjustified force must be held criminally accountable.
6. The publishing of all officer shift rosters at the end of each week, and the immediate online posting of all lapel camera video.
7. The recruitment of officer candidates who hold degrees, or have experience, in, social work or allied fields.
8. Limiting promotion to officers who have experience in, or show an inclination for, community-based policing.I don't know how ABQ Justice came to these expectations, but they seem in the aggregate to lack cohesion. Even if adopted by APD and the city -- which is unlikely -- they don't lead to reform (assuming reform is the desired outcome.)
What is most surprising to me is that they aren't based in concepts of racial and social justice. Instead they are aspects of information desired and the interests of those who developed the report.
Let's go one by one:
1. An independent agency to discipline officers and make policy.
As far as I know, no police department anywhere in the country has such a truly independent agency. The issue is "independence." How do you judge that? How to you ensure that? Police departments are the creations and creatures of civic authority, authority which is nominally vested in the elected representatives of the citizens, but which is actually almost always controlled and implemented by appointed officials, usually the City Manager or the equivalent. You can create a commission or review board or oversight agency, but the vexing problem is assuring its independence and authority outside the chain of command of the city's government. This is quite apart from the problems of oversight caused by police unions and their enforceable agreements. There is no "independence" in other words. Discipline has historically been a contractual matter, pursued internally; policy is ostensibly the purview of the elected representatives of the citizens, but policy recommendations are largely and implementation is entirely at the discretion of the City Manager and his/her delegates -- such as the police chief. If you want to change that, you have to change the whole structure of authority in city governments.
2. Routine extensive outreach to collect complaints against APD.
By whom? Police? Nonsense. The problem that is mentioned in the report is that those who might be making complaints of police abuse and misconduct are terrified of the police. Police, therefore, are not the appropriate civic authorities to do such outreach, but who is? Social service organizations? Perhaps. But the problem for most of them is that they are already overwhelmed and severely restricted in their abilities to perform services as it is. How are they to add further outreach to their responsibilities. And who would they report to? What would be done with these complaints? Would they go to a powerless quasi-independent agency to languish and eventually be dismissed -- as most complaints typically do? Or what?
3. The acceptance of anonymous complaints against APD.
That should be a no-brainer, but acceptance doesn't mean action.
4. The decriminalization of homelessness.
Homelessness per se is not a crime. Sleeping on the sidewalk or urinating in public may be crimes. The problems of homelessness are manifest, and the solutions are relatively obvious, but for whatever reason, policy makers largely refuse to employ them (ie: provide housing.) Using the criminal justice system (such as it is) to deal with homelessness is stupid. The issue isn't so much the criminalization of homelessness as it is a public policy of harassment and humiliation of the homeless, using the police and the so-called justice system to make already miserable lives worse.
5. Police officers who use unjustified force must be held criminally accountable.
Who decides what is "unjustified?" Again, the problem is lines of authority and where decision making lies. In theory, police are already held accountable for the use of unjustified force. The problem is that the police and district attorney in concert decide that (almost) all uses of force are "justified." The public may disagree, but the public has no control over the process and decision-making. There's no current mechanism to ensure that this expectation becomes operative.
6. The publishing of all officer shift rosters at the end of each week, and the immediate online posting of all lapel camera video.
The objective? The rosters should be available in real time, and there should be a secure (tamper-proof) lapel camera footage repository. In other words, camera footage should be uploaded as it is acquired rather than stored in the camera itself and uploaded at the discretion of the police. On the other hand, making all footage immediately available to the public seems counter productive.
7. The recruitment of officer candidates who hold degrees, or have experience, in, social work or allied fields.
While I understand why this could be desirable, I don't agree that police should be assigned to social work responsibility. This has been one of the major issues of hundreds of police involved shootings every year. Police are sent on calls that need social or medical worker intervention or services, with too often deadly results. Even when the police sent on these calls have special training and experience. The answer is to send social and medical workers, not police. But that means changing policies and protocols, and it means increasing the numbers of available non-police workers to go on such calls.
8. Limiting promotion to officers who have experience in, or show an inclination for, community-based policing.
Who will define the terms? "Community based policing" needs to be defined here. Then policies can be implemented and promotions made on the basis of those policies. Until then, this proposal is too vague to be useful.
If there had been a real tribunal last Sunday, there would have been charges presented against the city of Albuquerque and certain of its employees including the Mayor and the City Administrator and named police officers who have engaged in egregious or violent conduct.
A real tribunal would have then heard testimony from individuals who have been victims of police violence or other mistreatment and abuse, and the city authorities and police would have had an opportunity to present a defense either directly or by proxy.
Then the tribunal would have made a judgement and recommendations.
Instead, the report was presented as a fait accompli. The tribunal made no recommendations itself, nor did it render a judgement.
I like the tactic of a People's Tribunal, and I'd like to see it continued so as to make clear what the policing problems are and what to do about them... and to point out who is responsible.
This report and tribunal didn't quite do that.
Thursday, March 12, 2015
Burst of Action, Rage and Outrage in Ferguson
Well.
How much will these developments matter in the long run?
Ferguson's city authorities have been overhauling their little fiefdom by shuffling around some of the city's personnel and getting rid of some of the more egregious masters of the Negro Farm. The city manager was duly separated from his overseer seat; the police chief resigned; the municipal court judge who had been so good at harvesting the Negro crop for the city left town -- but he's still right next door; two police commanders who had chuckled over their racist email "jokes" took off for parts unknown; the racist court clerk who thought the Negroes were so funny also departed.
Things were looking somewhat positive in Ferguson for a change, though who would be stepping into the vacancies was anybody's guess. Given the economic structure of many of the municipalities in St. Louis County, it's hardly practical to bring in a more, shall we say, public-service oriented team.
The problem is that these tiny fiefdoms grandly called "cities" in St. Louis County are simply not economically viable unless the population or a significant portion of it is "farmed" as a cash crop might be. They do it in St Louis through the constant petty extractions of the municipal courts, backed up by predatory policing. It's a system worked out over many generations.
These things don't change overnight.
But overnight, shots rang out at the Ferguson Police HQ and Muni Court Building, an iconic symbol of the oppression the residents -- well, the black residents -- of Ferguson feel, and the sight of numerous protests and demonstrations since the outrageous killing of Mike Brown by FPD officer Darren Wilson last August.
Two police officers were wounded, though apparently neither of them were FPD officers.
There have been endless claims of "shots fired" during the protests against police violence in Ferguson, literally from the first moments of outrage after Darren Wilson shot and killed Mike Brown on Canfield Drive that hot August noon last years. Literally from the first moments of protest and outrage in Ferguson, the claim has been made by police that shots were fired. This statement was made over and over again during protests, but there was no proof of it, certainly no proof that members of the protest crowds were firing at police.
What we witnessed instead, through Livestreams and other mean, was police firing tear gas, flash grenades, smoke bombs, and rubber bullets at protesters. Time and time again. The police would only confront "peaceful protests" -- and they did it with such over the top armaments and technology that the scenes often turned chaotic and absurd, thanks to the police response to protesters. The police never interfered with arsonists, vandals, and looters, however. Never. They only responded to non-violent protests with overwhelming force.
And often their excuse was that somebody had fired at them, or they heard gunfire somewhere, or somebody not involved with the protests was arrested somewhere and they had a gun. They would show off the guns they had taken from people they arrested -- people who had nothing to do with the protests -- and they would often imply that these guns were being used by protesters against the police. But no such thing was happening, and there was never any evidence or proof whatever that protesters were firing at police.
There was abundant evidence that the police were firing at protesters, however.
All the police had to do was make the claim that they were being fired on by the protesters to justify in their own minds and the minds of their supporters their violence against nonviolent crowds.
It was an obvious tactic to garner support for their often outrageous actions. In the end, the claims of shots fired made their way into the DoJ's report on the Darren Wilson matter, as a justification for many actions -- such as leaving Mike Brown's body in the street for hour after hour. "There were reports..." of gunfire nearby, and as we know, force protection is the prime directive of all police forces and public entities everywhere, all the time. Thus, if there is any suggestion or suspicion of danger, protecting the force (and their fort) comes first and foremost.
So last night, as a protest demonstration in front of the Police Fort in Ferguson was winding down, shots really did ring out, and two officers -- neither from FPD -- were wounded. An "active shooter" situation was declared, police guns were drawn on the remnants of the crowd, and the fort was protected. Flying squads of police were dispatched to the site where the gunfire was thought to have have originated, well away from the few remaining protesters.
There were reports -- not confirmed that I know of -- that there were four shots, all of which reached their targets. In other words, two shots hit each police officer. The distance was calculated at about 200 yards, perhaps farther, as the exact location of the shooter was not determined. Obviously, however, whoever shot the officers was a skilled marksman, no doubt using a high powered rifle, perhaps with a nightscope.
A pro.
Immediately, there was speculation that this was a provocation, a false-flag operation by someone interested in stirring things up a bit. Could be. This is America, and false flag operations are as American as apple pie and motherhood.
But who knows. Sometimes what seems to be clear... isn't.
At any rate, the hand wringers are out in force; this incident will "kill the movement," yadda yadda, which, not surprisingly, is exactly what a false flag operation would be designed to do. "We must practice non-violence! Gandhi! King! etc." Yes, well, those who are so loudly invoking King and Gandhi at a time like this simply falsify history, but that's been going on so long, hardly anybody knows the real history of King's and Gandhi's movements, and those who do know are often loathe to dispute the received narrative.
The shooting of the officers in the Bronx was supposed to "kill the movement," too. Of course the police and the defenders of their violence and murder utilize any incident like the one overnight -- incidents which are very, very rare -- to claim that the police are under constant assault and attack from the murderous public. We hear it all the time. It's false, but now and then there are incidents in which police are attacked and even wounded. Now and then.
What happened in Ferguson overnight is anybody's guess, and given the way "gunfire" has been investigated throughout the protests against police violence, I expect we will never know what happened or who was responsible.
Finding that out is not a particular priority.
The priority is to declare the people at war with the police, and thus to justify any level of suppression deemed necessary.
We'll see how it shakes out in the daylight...
How much will these developments matter in the long run?
Ferguson's city authorities have been overhauling their little fiefdom by shuffling around some of the city's personnel and getting rid of some of the more egregious masters of the Negro Farm. The city manager was duly separated from his overseer seat; the police chief resigned; the municipal court judge who had been so good at harvesting the Negro crop for the city left town -- but he's still right next door; two police commanders who had chuckled over their racist email "jokes" took off for parts unknown; the racist court clerk who thought the Negroes were so funny also departed.
Things were looking somewhat positive in Ferguson for a change, though who would be stepping into the vacancies was anybody's guess. Given the economic structure of many of the municipalities in St. Louis County, it's hardly practical to bring in a more, shall we say, public-service oriented team.
The problem is that these tiny fiefdoms grandly called "cities" in St. Louis County are simply not economically viable unless the population or a significant portion of it is "farmed" as a cash crop might be. They do it in St Louis through the constant petty extractions of the municipal courts, backed up by predatory policing. It's a system worked out over many generations.
These things don't change overnight.
But overnight, shots rang out at the Ferguson Police HQ and Muni Court Building, an iconic symbol of the oppression the residents -- well, the black residents -- of Ferguson feel, and the sight of numerous protests and demonstrations since the outrageous killing of Mike Brown by FPD officer Darren Wilson last August.
Two police officers were wounded, though apparently neither of them were FPD officers.
There have been endless claims of "shots fired" during the protests against police violence in Ferguson, literally from the first moments of outrage after Darren Wilson shot and killed Mike Brown on Canfield Drive that hot August noon last years. Literally from the first moments of protest and outrage in Ferguson, the claim has been made by police that shots were fired. This statement was made over and over again during protests, but there was no proof of it, certainly no proof that members of the protest crowds were firing at police.
What we witnessed instead, through Livestreams and other mean, was police firing tear gas, flash grenades, smoke bombs, and rubber bullets at protesters. Time and time again. The police would only confront "peaceful protests" -- and they did it with such over the top armaments and technology that the scenes often turned chaotic and absurd, thanks to the police response to protesters. The police never interfered with arsonists, vandals, and looters, however. Never. They only responded to non-violent protests with overwhelming force.
And often their excuse was that somebody had fired at them, or they heard gunfire somewhere, or somebody not involved with the protests was arrested somewhere and they had a gun. They would show off the guns they had taken from people they arrested -- people who had nothing to do with the protests -- and they would often imply that these guns were being used by protesters against the police. But no such thing was happening, and there was never any evidence or proof whatever that protesters were firing at police.
There was abundant evidence that the police were firing at protesters, however.
All the police had to do was make the claim that they were being fired on by the protesters to justify in their own minds and the minds of their supporters their violence against nonviolent crowds.
It was an obvious tactic to garner support for their often outrageous actions. In the end, the claims of shots fired made their way into the DoJ's report on the Darren Wilson matter, as a justification for many actions -- such as leaving Mike Brown's body in the street for hour after hour. "There were reports..." of gunfire nearby, and as we know, force protection is the prime directive of all police forces and public entities everywhere, all the time. Thus, if there is any suggestion or suspicion of danger, protecting the force (and their fort) comes first and foremost.
So last night, as a protest demonstration in front of the Police Fort in Ferguson was winding down, shots really did ring out, and two officers -- neither from FPD -- were wounded. An "active shooter" situation was declared, police guns were drawn on the remnants of the crowd, and the fort was protected. Flying squads of police were dispatched to the site where the gunfire was thought to have have originated, well away from the few remaining protesters.
There were reports -- not confirmed that I know of -- that there were four shots, all of which reached their targets. In other words, two shots hit each police officer. The distance was calculated at about 200 yards, perhaps farther, as the exact location of the shooter was not determined. Obviously, however, whoever shot the officers was a skilled marksman, no doubt using a high powered rifle, perhaps with a nightscope.
A pro.
Immediately, there was speculation that this was a provocation, a false-flag operation by someone interested in stirring things up a bit. Could be. This is America, and false flag operations are as American as apple pie and motherhood.
But who knows. Sometimes what seems to be clear... isn't.
At any rate, the hand wringers are out in force; this incident will "kill the movement," yadda yadda, which, not surprisingly, is exactly what a false flag operation would be designed to do. "We must practice non-violence! Gandhi! King! etc." Yes, well, those who are so loudly invoking King and Gandhi at a time like this simply falsify history, but that's been going on so long, hardly anybody knows the real history of King's and Gandhi's movements, and those who do know are often loathe to dispute the received narrative.
The shooting of the officers in the Bronx was supposed to "kill the movement," too. Of course the police and the defenders of their violence and murder utilize any incident like the one overnight -- incidents which are very, very rare -- to claim that the police are under constant assault and attack from the murderous public. We hear it all the time. It's false, but now and then there are incidents in which police are attacked and even wounded. Now and then.
What happened in Ferguson overnight is anybody's guess, and given the way "gunfire" has been investigated throughout the protests against police violence, I expect we will never know what happened or who was responsible.
Finding that out is not a particular priority.
The priority is to declare the people at war with the police, and thus to justify any level of suppression deemed necessary.
We'll see how it shakes out in the daylight...
Saturday, March 7, 2015
Additionally, the Ferguson PD Report and the DoJ Failure to Find Fault With Brave Officer Wilson's Bravely Killing Michael Brown
The cognitive dissonance is strong with this one-two punch.
The DoJ's scathing report [105 pg pdf] on the pattern and practices of unconstitutional policing in Ferguson, MO was released pretty much simultaneously with the failure of the DoJ to find fault [86 pg document file] with the killing of Michael Brown by Darren Wilson, the singularity which has led to months and months of protest actions all across the country, and what's called a "national conversation" about the problems of racist policing and violent cops.
Yes, indeed.
One scathing report after another; one policeman-killer after another allowed to walk free.
It's quite a pattern, and there are reasons for it.
The dissonance is deliberate.
Yes, the police in Ferguson and many other places around the country are racists and practice racist policing. There are so many places where this is true, we might say it is all but universal. Police best practices presume the guile and the guilt of an array of minority and poverty stricken sectors of the population as a matter of course.
Statistically, the crime and criminality of minority and poor sectors of the population appears to be a fact. Thus the presumption is said to be justified. But when the statistics are broken down, it becomes clear that the presumption of guile and guilt is self fulfilling in that police interest and action is concentrated in minority communities, poor communities, marginal communities, and in many cases, police create the crime they then suppress and profit from. It's all quite circular.
When the DoJ investigates and declares a police department to have a pattern and practice of "unconstitutional policing" -- including racist policing -- it is merely pointing to the obvious. In the case of Ferguson, nearly every complaint we've been hearing in the media about the FPD is validated by the DoJ report. The local police operate as a racket, extorting money from the people, primarily the black residents of Ferguson, to fund police and city operations. It's deliberate intent every step of the way. It involves violence as well as more subtle coercion. It's been going on a long time. It is racist at its core.
Anyone who's been following the story is not surprised by these findings. We've been hearing and reading about it for months. Anybody who is familiar with the way St. Louis and the County work is familiar with the patterns and practices detailed in the Ferguson report. It's the same throughout the County. It's monstrous. And according to the DoJ, it's unconstitutional.
On the other hand, the white folks are quite satisfied, it would seem, and want nothing to change.
Similar patterns and practices are found all over the country, but perhaps the most egregious examples are found in the South -- where cities and towns in many cases have always worked this way -- and in the Border regions, such as St. Louis and Baltimore and so forth.
I've been calling it "Negro Farming" for some time, the idea being that black residents of these towns and cities are regarded as a cash crop, to be farmed and harvested of whatever money can be squeezed out of them. That's their chief -- in many cases their only -- value to the Powers That Be, and they, like any other crop, have no say in the matter.
I was thinking about this the other day in the context of what I know about city managers and their thinking. I've only had experience in this field in Sacramento where working on reform of a violent (though not particularly murderous) police force required dealing with the city manager and his office. Like most other cities, the city manager of Sacramento is in charge of the police department.
What I learned very quickly is that the city manager's office categorizes the population according to their worth to the city -- ie: how much revenue they produce, or contrariwise, how much of a cost burden they are to the city.
The city manager's constant goal is to maximize the revenue value and minimize the cost burden of the population. They segment the population by district, by age, race and gender, by income, and by occupation -- among other categories. As a rule well off white people are considered "contributors" to the civic enterprise (oh, yes, the city is itself an "enterprise" with many subsidiary enterprises all of which are treated as revenue sources or cost burdens). Well off white people are considered contributors because they own property and/or businesses which are taxed, generally quite modestly, but taxed just the same. They produce a reliable revenue stream.
On the other hand, poor people, people of color, the marginal, the mentally ill, the addicted, and so forth are almost universally considered revenue drains, costs in other words, and in every civic enterprise I'm familiar with, costs must be contained -- unless there is an off-setting revenue stream. That stream can come from an outside source -- say state or federal funding for programs or prisons -- or it can be extracted through fines and so forth from the people themselves.
Because the revenues extracted in this manner are not generally reliable, however, the place of the people from whom it is extracted is never equivalent to that of well off white people whose revenue stream is much more reliable.
This is a very simple model of what goes on in most towns and cities where populations are routinely categorized according to their civic value.
But it is the basic model that underpins how Ferguson and surrounding cities treats their populations.
In this model, someone like Mike Brown has no value.
Someone like Darren Wilson does have value.
Thus the dissonance between condemnation of an unconstitutional pattern and practice of policing -- and the failure to find fault with Darren Wilson's actions that hot day in August 2014 when he shot and killed Mike Brown in the streets of Ferguson.
The pattern and practice of policing -- not just in Ferguson but generally -- is justifiably condemned as unconstitutional, but it is based on the civic value of individuals and population segments, and the lower the value, the greater the excuse for use of force, violence and death in dealing with them.
The problems come when the costs of use of force, violence and death outrun the revenues that can be derived from the force and violence. And that's happening in city after city.
Whether it will happen in Ferguson, I don't know. Immense efforts (and expenses) have been made to protect Darren Wilson throughout this episode, efforts and expenses which are continuing. I don't know why he is being protected this way, but he is. The various "exonerations" of his actions that have taken place appear to be intended to limit or eliminate any civil award Mike Brown's family might receive, but even that is not clear. Something is going on behind the scenes in which Darren Wilson is seen as a victim somehow, whereas Mike Brown is being cast as the perpetrator. This has been going on since the killing itself. What actually happened and why is not as important as the narrative competition that's been produced. It's as if Wilson and Brown are proxies for a police/civilian culture clash that can only be resolved in favor of the police.
This is something to keep in mind: DoJ is always going to favor the police, even when they issue their scathing reports. In fact, police departments routinely defy these reports and recommendations. It's cultural. And DoJ has no independent enforcement power over police conduct. Any enforcement must come through the courts, and the courts have almost no enforcement powers independent of the police they are attempting to reform.
Consequently, if the police want to -- or they are directed to by their city managers and police chiefs -- they can and do ignore and defy these scathing reports and recommendations.
DoJ will let them get away with it, may even encourage it clandestinely.
We see it right up front with the Ferguson report and the Wilson matter: clean up your act (if you want) but no one will fault you for killing black people.
Reform itself is not enough.
The DoJ's scathing report [105 pg pdf] on the pattern and practices of unconstitutional policing in Ferguson, MO was released pretty much simultaneously with the failure of the DoJ to find fault [86 pg document file] with the killing of Michael Brown by Darren Wilson, the singularity which has led to months and months of protest actions all across the country, and what's called a "national conversation" about the problems of racist policing and violent cops.
Yes, indeed.
One scathing report after another; one policeman-killer after another allowed to walk free.
It's quite a pattern, and there are reasons for it.
The dissonance is deliberate.
Yes, the police in Ferguson and many other places around the country are racists and practice racist policing. There are so many places where this is true, we might say it is all but universal. Police best practices presume the guile and the guilt of an array of minority and poverty stricken sectors of the population as a matter of course.
Statistically, the crime and criminality of minority and poor sectors of the population appears to be a fact. Thus the presumption is said to be justified. But when the statistics are broken down, it becomes clear that the presumption of guile and guilt is self fulfilling in that police interest and action is concentrated in minority communities, poor communities, marginal communities, and in many cases, police create the crime they then suppress and profit from. It's all quite circular.
When the DoJ investigates and declares a police department to have a pattern and practice of "unconstitutional policing" -- including racist policing -- it is merely pointing to the obvious. In the case of Ferguson, nearly every complaint we've been hearing in the media about the FPD is validated by the DoJ report. The local police operate as a racket, extorting money from the people, primarily the black residents of Ferguson, to fund police and city operations. It's deliberate intent every step of the way. It involves violence as well as more subtle coercion. It's been going on a long time. It is racist at its core.
Anyone who's been following the story is not surprised by these findings. We've been hearing and reading about it for months. Anybody who is familiar with the way St. Louis and the County work is familiar with the patterns and practices detailed in the Ferguson report. It's the same throughout the County. It's monstrous. And according to the DoJ, it's unconstitutional.
On the other hand, the white folks are quite satisfied, it would seem, and want nothing to change.
Similar patterns and practices are found all over the country, but perhaps the most egregious examples are found in the South -- where cities and towns in many cases have always worked this way -- and in the Border regions, such as St. Louis and Baltimore and so forth.
I've been calling it "Negro Farming" for some time, the idea being that black residents of these towns and cities are regarded as a cash crop, to be farmed and harvested of whatever money can be squeezed out of them. That's their chief -- in many cases their only -- value to the Powers That Be, and they, like any other crop, have no say in the matter.
I was thinking about this the other day in the context of what I know about city managers and their thinking. I've only had experience in this field in Sacramento where working on reform of a violent (though not particularly murderous) police force required dealing with the city manager and his office. Like most other cities, the city manager of Sacramento is in charge of the police department.
What I learned very quickly is that the city manager's office categorizes the population according to their worth to the city -- ie: how much revenue they produce, or contrariwise, how much of a cost burden they are to the city.
The city manager's constant goal is to maximize the revenue value and minimize the cost burden of the population. They segment the population by district, by age, race and gender, by income, and by occupation -- among other categories. As a rule well off white people are considered "contributors" to the civic enterprise (oh, yes, the city is itself an "enterprise" with many subsidiary enterprises all of which are treated as revenue sources or cost burdens). Well off white people are considered contributors because they own property and/or businesses which are taxed, generally quite modestly, but taxed just the same. They produce a reliable revenue stream.
On the other hand, poor people, people of color, the marginal, the mentally ill, the addicted, and so forth are almost universally considered revenue drains, costs in other words, and in every civic enterprise I'm familiar with, costs must be contained -- unless there is an off-setting revenue stream. That stream can come from an outside source -- say state or federal funding for programs or prisons -- or it can be extracted through fines and so forth from the people themselves.
Because the revenues extracted in this manner are not generally reliable, however, the place of the people from whom it is extracted is never equivalent to that of well off white people whose revenue stream is much more reliable.
This is a very simple model of what goes on in most towns and cities where populations are routinely categorized according to their civic value.
But it is the basic model that underpins how Ferguson and surrounding cities treats their populations.
In this model, someone like Mike Brown has no value.
Someone like Darren Wilson does have value.
Thus the dissonance between condemnation of an unconstitutional pattern and practice of policing -- and the failure to find fault with Darren Wilson's actions that hot day in August 2014 when he shot and killed Mike Brown in the streets of Ferguson.
The pattern and practice of policing -- not just in Ferguson but generally -- is justifiably condemned as unconstitutional, but it is based on the civic value of individuals and population segments, and the lower the value, the greater the excuse for use of force, violence and death in dealing with them.
The problems come when the costs of use of force, violence and death outrun the revenues that can be derived from the force and violence. And that's happening in city after city.
Whether it will happen in Ferguson, I don't know. Immense efforts (and expenses) have been made to protect Darren Wilson throughout this episode, efforts and expenses which are continuing. I don't know why he is being protected this way, but he is. The various "exonerations" of his actions that have taken place appear to be intended to limit or eliminate any civil award Mike Brown's family might receive, but even that is not clear. Something is going on behind the scenes in which Darren Wilson is seen as a victim somehow, whereas Mike Brown is being cast as the perpetrator. This has been going on since the killing itself. What actually happened and why is not as important as the narrative competition that's been produced. It's as if Wilson and Brown are proxies for a police/civilian culture clash that can only be resolved in favor of the police.
This is something to keep in mind: DoJ is always going to favor the police, even when they issue their scathing reports. In fact, police departments routinely defy these reports and recommendations. It's cultural. And DoJ has no independent enforcement power over police conduct. Any enforcement must come through the courts, and the courts have almost no enforcement powers independent of the police they are attempting to reform.
Consequently, if the police want to -- or they are directed to by their city managers and police chiefs -- they can and do ignore and defy these scathing reports and recommendations.
DoJ will let them get away with it, may even encourage it clandestinely.
We see it right up front with the Ferguson report and the Wilson matter: clean up your act (if you want) but no one will fault you for killing black people.
Reform itself is not enough.
Tuesday, March 3, 2015
So The President's Police Commission [Interim] Report Was Released And...
I missed it. Well, no. I saw the headline but had to gloss over it due to more pressing matters. Turned out the news report I saw didn't link to the actual report anyway.
Apparently, its main recommendation is to form a task force to make further recommendations.
Punt!
Yeah, no real change at all, no real change likely, not now, not ever. The way things are is the way they are supposed to be and the way they will be for all time to come, world without end, amen.
Bill Bratton, Dave Grossman and all their acolytes and devotees have yet again won the day.
I finally found a news report that actually links to the commission's findings and lists the major other recommendations made by the commission. It took some searching, and that tells me that the commission is being treated as irrelevant, its recommendations optional, and that the media-government has no particular interest in the matter. Things will stay as they are.
But these are the main recommendations of the Commission as listed by Philly.com in a post titled:
TLDR: Key Recommendations from Obama's policing task force
(Link to the actual report. 115 pg PDF. You be the judge.)
Sigh.
Well, this is pure Bratton and Grossman, it has little or nothing to do with what the public has been trying to communicate to the Powers That Be about national problem of violent policing.
What this report tries to do is re-conceive the problem, not as one of violent policing, but as one of perceptions -- perceptions which can be changed by better communications and slight modifications in behavior.
In other words, keep doing what you're doing, only be smoother and less aggressive about it.
Keep on your killing spree because that's what's driven down crime rates. But do it with a bit more.... finesse. So as not to rile the peeps so much. M'Kay?
Recommendation #1, this "guardian mindset," is pure Grossman and his "sheepdog" bullshit. It's time to take the blinders off. Grossman uses that "sheepdog" analogy all the time and it's now emblazend on the minds of movie-goers thanks to its uncredited use in "American Sniper." It's been a factor in police culture for decades, and it is one of the reasons why there are so many killings by police.
The police are brainwashed to believe that their highest accomplishment is to "kill the wolf" -- and the "wolf" is defined as anyone who deviates from the fold, not someone who preys on the flock at all, merely someone who doesn't quite fit the standard set by the shepherd and ultimately by the owner of the flock.
The Guardian/Sheepdog doesn't work for and doesn't care about the flock per se. The Guardian/Sheepdog works for the shepherd -- who in turn works for the owner(s) of the flock, an the Guardian/Sheepdog's highest goal is the approval of the shepherd and the owner(s).
When the Commission says their first recommendation is for the police to adopt a "guardian mindset" all it means is that they are recommending that all police start with the insane premise Grossman has been promoting for decades.
It doesn't have anything to do with police violence and killing; it may in fact increase the level of violence and killing overall.
Yes, indeed, let's have another task force with more recommendations. Let's have more Best Practices.
Sigh.
Apparently, its main recommendation is to form a task force to make further recommendations.
Punt!
Yeah, no real change at all, no real change likely, not now, not ever. The way things are is the way they are supposed to be and the way they will be for all time to come, world without end, amen.
Bill Bratton, Dave Grossman and all their acolytes and devotees have yet again won the day.
How and why does this happen over and over and over again? Just like police shootings, the same scenario plays out again and again, study after study is commissioned, excuses and made, nothing changes
I finally found a news report that actually links to the commission's findings and lists the major other recommendations made by the commission. It took some searching, and that tells me that the commission is being treated as irrelevant, its recommendations optional, and that the media-government has no particular interest in the matter. Things will stay as they are.
But these are the main recommendations of the Commission as listed by Philly.com in a post titled:
TLDR: Key Recommendations from Obama's policing task force
(Link to the actual report. 115 pg PDF. You be the judge.)
Read more at http://www.philly.com/philly/news/politics/TLDR-Key-recommendations-from-the-21st-Century-policing-task-force-report-Philadelphia.html#UcekdW3YCCytZRHL.991. Embrace a guardian mindset to build public trust and legitimacy.2. Acknowledge the role of policing in past and present injustice and discrimination and how it is a hurdle to the promotion of community trust.3. Establish a culture of transparency and accountability in order to build public trust and legitimacy.4. Law enforcement agencies should promote legitimacy internally within the organization by applying the principles of procedural justice.5. Proactively promote public trust by initiating positive nonenforcement activities.6. Consider the potential damage to public trust when implementing crime fighting strategies.7. Track the level of trust in police by their communities just as changes in crime are measured.8. Strive to create a workforce that contains a broad range of diversity9. Build relationships based on trust with immigrant communities.10. Collaborate to develop policies and strategies in communities disproportionately affected by crime.11. Develop comprehensive policies on the use of force that include training, investigations, prosecutions, data collection, and information sharing.12. Mandate external and independent criminal investigations in cases of police use of force resulting in death, officer-involved shootings resulting in injury or death, or in-custody deaths. Report data on all officer-involved shootings to the Federal Government.13. Adopt identification procedures that eliminate or minimize presenter bias or influence.14. Release department’s demographic data.15. Collect demographic data on all stops and arrests.16. Implement response protocols to mass demonstrations that prioritize de-escalation.17. Use civilian oversight of law enforcement to strengthen trust with the community18. Refrain from quotas for arrests, tickets or summonses. Don’t use quotas to generate revenue.19. Seek consent before a search and explain that a person has the right to refuse consent when there is no warrant or probable cause.20. Adopt and enforce policies prohibiting profiling and discrimination21. Federal agencies should provide technical assistance and incentive funding to jurisdictions with small police agencies and encourage small departments to consolidate.22. Establish national standards for the research and development of new technology, for instance, body-worn cameras and social media.23. The Department of Justice should develop best practices that can be adopted by state legislative bodies to govern the acquisition, use, retention, and dissemination of auditory, visual, and biometric data by law enforcement.24. Update public record laws.25. Federal government should support the development of new “less than lethal” technology to help control combative suspects.26. Require both basic recruit and in-service training on policing in a democratic society.
Sigh.
Well, this is pure Bratton and Grossman, it has little or nothing to do with what the public has been trying to communicate to the Powers That Be about national problem of violent policing.
What this report tries to do is re-conceive the problem, not as one of violent policing, but as one of perceptions -- perceptions which can be changed by better communications and slight modifications in behavior.
In other words, keep doing what you're doing, only be smoother and less aggressive about it.
Keep on your killing spree because that's what's driven down crime rates. But do it with a bit more.... finesse. So as not to rile the peeps so much. M'Kay?
Recommendation #1, this "guardian mindset," is pure Grossman and his "sheepdog" bullshit. It's time to take the blinders off. Grossman uses that "sheepdog" analogy all the time and it's now emblazend on the minds of movie-goers thanks to its uncredited use in "American Sniper." It's been a factor in police culture for decades, and it is one of the reasons why there are so many killings by police.
The police are brainwashed to believe that their highest accomplishment is to "kill the wolf" -- and the "wolf" is defined as anyone who deviates from the fold, not someone who preys on the flock at all, merely someone who doesn't quite fit the standard set by the shepherd and ultimately by the owner of the flock.
The Guardian/Sheepdog doesn't work for and doesn't care about the flock per se. The Guardian/Sheepdog works for the shepherd -- who in turn works for the owner(s) of the flock, an the Guardian/Sheepdog's highest goal is the approval of the shepherd and the owner(s).
When the Commission says their first recommendation is for the police to adopt a "guardian mindset" all it means is that they are recommending that all police start with the insane premise Grossman has been promoting for decades.
It doesn't have anything to do with police violence and killing; it may in fact increase the level of violence and killing overall.
Yes, indeed, let's have another task force with more recommendations. Let's have more Best Practices.
Sigh.
Monday, March 2, 2015
An Automatic Death Sentence From Which There Is No Appeal
I can't tell for sure what all is going on here, but a man is dead after being shot by police in Los Angeles, that much is clear.
Yet another execution on the streets of LA. Happens all the time.
The man is seen in the video disobeying and struggling with the po-po. He should have known that would be a death sentence. Many of those commenting on the video say as much. Po-po seem to believe it without question: disobedience and struggling with the police is justification for use of lethal force in most jurisdictions, most especially in places like the meaner streets of Los Angeles where this incident took place.
The police claim that the man they shot and killed was "going for the gun" of one of the officers. This is the justification police use almost as often as the "reaching for his waistband" justification. They are often false justifications, but you can see for yourself that it is difficult/impossible to tell whether the man they shot and killed in this video was "going for" a gun or anything else. It looks like he's simply trying to ward off the blows raining down on him, but it's too dark and the distance is too great to be sure.
Po-po lie routinely and they are routinely allowed to get away with it, so I would not take their word without question.
On the other hand, video isn't necessarily conclusive. This one certainly isn't, but it will have to do until something more definitive shows up.
The point here, obvious as sin, is that the man who was shot and killed was disobedient and struggled with police, and whenever that happens, it seems that the police have full authority to kill at will.
Just as they have the authority to kill any Negro they see with a gun -- or who they think has a gun. It doesn't matter whether it's true or not. All that matters is their perception.
At any rate, another man is dead on the streets of LA, killed by police. He was black and homeless and possibly mentally ill or impaired, but all that really matters in the eyes of the police is that he was disobedient and struggled with the police.
Doing so is in their eyes justification for summary execution.
They are cowards, every one of them.
Sunday, March 1, 2015
On the Meaning of Homan Square and Places Like It
Yesterday there was a rally of a couple of hundred or maybe more protesters at the Chicago "black site" known as "Homan Square," a former Sears warehouse that has been turned into an off the books police interrogation and detention site.
Thanks to Spencer Ackerman's reporting for the Guardian, Homan Square has become a Big Deal in the civil liberties community. It wasn't back in the day. The anger and protest that has been elicited since Spencer and others at the Guardian have been reporting on the connections between domestic policing and corrections practices and the torture regimes in our various gulags, particularly Gitmo and Chicago, are due to the confluence of various factors, movements and protests.
In 2012, though Homan Square and what went on there was known of and reported on, it didn't cause the kind of outrage or the level of outrage and public pressure for change that it does today. In 2012, most people -- including the victims of the Homan Square practices -- pretty much took it for granted. They knew it was wrong and said so, but at the time, it seemed like nothing could be done about it.
Now it seems that something can be done about it, thanks to the various movements against police misconduct and violence that have arisen more or less spontaneously around the country. The people are sick of it. And they are not passively tolerating it anymore. They are pushing back, and they won't quit until and unless the police desist in their fantasy of "protecting and serving" -- by brutalizing and killing at will without consequence.
The Chicago-land media is falling all over itself trying to diminish the importance of Homan Square and what has been going on there for years. They're extremely defensive about the lack of local reporting over the years about the facility and its functions. They've been trolling lawyers to come forth and say that Homan Square is no worse than any other Chicago police precinct when it comes to legal representation and detainee abuse.
"It's a systemic problem!" they say. Well, yes, yes it is. "So stop focusing on Homan Square!" No, to stop now would not be wise.
The subtext, of course, is that because Homan Square has been primarily "processing" accused gang-bangers and the like, what goes on there is A Good Thing, because it's Keeping Us Safe. Yet so much of the testimony of those "processed" at Homan Square, whether accused of gang-perfidy or not, has involved innocent people who were detained and abused just... because. "They fit the profile."
This is -- or should be -- unacceptable on its face.
Unfortunately, for too long it wasn't.
It was thought to be proper.
And it is still going on.
Not just at Homan Square, but all across the land.
It's time to shut down the domestic Gitmos and the Gulags, and it's time to overhaul the whole idea of police, policing, and "corrections" in this country. It's past time.
That's the of this and other protest movements that have captured the imaginations of so much of the country. We can do better than this. We are better than this. And we don't need Homan Squares to be safe.
------------------------------------------------------
The story is being covered very well at the Guardian.
The Chicago Tribune and Sun-Times however have basically been caught with their blinders on...
Much of the rest of American media has largely ignored this story, though some have re-printed some of the Guardian's coverage.
Amy Goodman interviewed Spencer Ackerman for Democracy Now!:
Thanks to Spencer Ackerman's reporting for the Guardian, Homan Square has become a Big Deal in the civil liberties community. It wasn't back in the day. The anger and protest that has been elicited since Spencer and others at the Guardian have been reporting on the connections between domestic policing and corrections practices and the torture regimes in our various gulags, particularly Gitmo and Chicago, are due to the confluence of various factors, movements and protests.
In 2012, though Homan Square and what went on there was known of and reported on, it didn't cause the kind of outrage or the level of outrage and public pressure for change that it does today. In 2012, most people -- including the victims of the Homan Square practices -- pretty much took it for granted. They knew it was wrong and said so, but at the time, it seemed like nothing could be done about it.
Now it seems that something can be done about it, thanks to the various movements against police misconduct and violence that have arisen more or less spontaneously around the country. The people are sick of it. And they are not passively tolerating it anymore. They are pushing back, and they won't quit until and unless the police desist in their fantasy of "protecting and serving" -- by brutalizing and killing at will without consequence.
The Chicago-land media is falling all over itself trying to diminish the importance of Homan Square and what has been going on there for years. They're extremely defensive about the lack of local reporting over the years about the facility and its functions. They've been trolling lawyers to come forth and say that Homan Square is no worse than any other Chicago police precinct when it comes to legal representation and detainee abuse.
"It's a systemic problem!" they say. Well, yes, yes it is. "So stop focusing on Homan Square!" No, to stop now would not be wise.
The subtext, of course, is that because Homan Square has been primarily "processing" accused gang-bangers and the like, what goes on there is A Good Thing, because it's Keeping Us Safe. Yet so much of the testimony of those "processed" at Homan Square, whether accused of gang-perfidy or not, has involved innocent people who were detained and abused just... because. "They fit the profile."
This is -- or should be -- unacceptable on its face.
Unfortunately, for too long it wasn't.
It was thought to be proper.
And it is still going on.
Not just at Homan Square, but all across the land.
It's time to shut down the domestic Gitmos and the Gulags, and it's time to overhaul the whole idea of police, policing, and "corrections" in this country. It's past time.
That's the of this and other protest movements that have captured the imaginations of so much of the country. We can do better than this. We are better than this. And we don't need Homan Squares to be safe.
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The story is being covered very well at the Guardian.
The Chicago Tribune and Sun-Times however have basically been caught with their blinders on...
Much of the rest of American media has largely ignored this story, though some have re-printed some of the Guardian's coverage.
Amy Goodman interviewed Spencer Ackerman for Democracy Now!:
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