I didn’t want to let this interesting juxtaposition of ideas go by without taking note of it. First, there’s this:
There are two fundamental prisms through which to view the heart-rending story in Ferguson. The first is that it was a tragic episode in which an unarmed young black man, Michael Brown, lost his life in an altercation with a police officer and that the matter, like all such matters, had to be parsed and adjudicated through the local criminal-justice system. That meant waiting for all evidence to be gathered and weighed before rushing to judgment. It meant further that we ultimately must place our trust in the justice system, which certainly isn’t perfect, but it is all we have—and is likely to be carefully pursued particularly when it is under intense and emotional public scrutiny, as it was in Ferguson.
but on the other hand there’s this:
The other prism presents a different picture, one that sees the Ferguson events as a reflection of a serious national problem of white racism within law enforcement and in the criminal-justice system. Viewed through this prism, Michael Brown’s death not only should bring an indictment against Darren Wilson, but represented an indictment against elements of American society. The two aren’t separable, in this view. Michael Brown didn’t get a fair break from the police officer during that altercation, and if Wilson wasn’t punished through the criminal-justice system, then that represents automatic evidence of something seriously wrong with the criminal-justice system.
I believe that this view predisposes one to treat persons as means rather than ends and, consequently, is immoral and should be called out as such.
In the final analysis I guess that I don’t believe that you can have a just end without employing just means. The belief that you can’t make an omelet without breaking eggs can be used to justify anything.
I think the problem is broader one – police shoot too often and they are very rarely held accountable when they kill someone who shouldn’t have been killed. Compare/contrast Michael Brown with, for instance, Michael Bell.
I think the problem is a broader one as well. However, IMO, it expands to a society that is becoming increasingly more at odds with itself — creating deeper divisions of people, which only promotes more hostility, less trust, impulsive actions and the like in scenarios where you have this kind of confrontation.
Furthermore, whatever change people do want has greater possibilites of happening if they are implemented by positive protests and purposeful tenacity, rather than violent oportunitistic fringes creating chaos and harm to others.
Elements of both ideas can be true, and they do not necessarily apply in this case. The way it was initially handled by Officer Wilson was botched, but that is based upon my experience dealing with criminals. In NOLA during the 1980’s, Michael Brown’s crime would have been about as serious as jaywalking.
If the reports about Michael Brown trying to take Officer Wilson’s weapon and then refusing to stop approaching him, Michael Brown was a dead man walking, and Officer Wilson would be justified shooting him.
There are several posts, and I am going to just comment here. I am still pissed about all these rich white liberal assholes. They are the problem, and they are the racists.
Jon Stewart, Bill Maher, Nancy Pelosi, famous fiction writers, OTB commenters, and the like could help solve these problems by moving into these communities, but instead they run away as if black people have Ebola.
If more rich white assholes lived in these communities, there would be more businesses than cash checking places, pawn shops, gold exchanges, and liquor stores. They would increase the tax base for the community. By enrolling their children in the public schools, they would help to improve the local education system.
If they believe the cops are racist, they could get rid of them. With the extra money, they could replace them with K5 robots. They could get rid of any other racist practices they decry, but it will never happen.
They will never live around too many black people, especially poor black people. They would live next door to a flag flying Klansman before they would move into Ferguson or three blocks from the St. Thomas Projects.
Again, I ask how many racists must move onto a white liberal’s block before they move? The white liberal begin moving out fast when the blacks start moving in. There are a few adventurous white liberals who will move into black communities, but they promptly begin moving the black people out. They love black people. The just do not love black people being to close.
Property taxes are their first tool. When property values go up, the poor blacks cannot afford the increased property taxes, and the rich white liberals are able to acquire more property. If they really cared about poor people, a homestead exemption for the first $100,000 of the homes value would solve the problem, but helping poor people is not the problem.
Also, poor people are not driven to crime. This implies that poor people are lazy and shiftless, or they are morally corrupt. Poor people have moral fortitude. The ability to resist the urge to steal is not a result of white privilege or wealth. I have known criminals and poor people, and they are not necessarily the same.
I will close before my head explodes. As with most of these incidents, little of it makes any sense to me. Michael Brown was not acting like a robber (armed or unarmed) should. If Officer Wilson knew he was unarmed, he handled it wrong. If Officer Wilson did not know he was armed, he handled it wrong. If Officer Wilson did not know anything about the robbery, he handled it wrong.
As a law enforcement officer, it is your job to be in charge of the situation at all times. You do not rely upon anybody doing what they should do. What Michael Brown should or should not have done was immaterial from the law enforcement officer’s point of view. Michael Brown was not in charge.
The middle of the street is not the place to engage somebody. The stray bullets could have hit somebody. Civilians can interfere. There are witnesses. There could be traffic. Sometimes, there are no other options, but other times, you would do better to choose a more optimal location.
The same principle applies to the shooting. Officer Wilson was in charge, and when Michael Brown tried to take his weapon and refused to stop. Officer Wilson was not required to run away. He was justified to protect himself against somebody who had just tried to take his weapon.
You’ve touched on a point here I’d been meaning to mention. Ferguson’s tax base is pretty limited and it’s going to get even more limited after the events of the last few months. How Ferguson is supposed to be able to afford everything that those making their recommendations from a distance are prescribing I have no idea.
Also, note the stores mentioned as having been damaged: auto parts store, bakery. In other words it’s not exactly an inner city ghetto neighborhood. They aren’t just vestiges, either. These stores were black-owned. I think that the media are trying to shoehorn these events into a preconceived narrative that doesn’t really fit all of the facts.
Stop the nonsense.
There is no trajedy here. A very big, violent black thug robbed a convenience store and roughed up the owner. He then sauntered down the middle of the street with his loot and abettor. When acosted by Wilson, he assaulted Wilson in the cop car and fought for Wilson’s gun. When the gun went off, he then started to run away. When Wilson ordered him to stop, he charged Wilson, who legitimately shot and killed him.
There is no racism here other than that of Obama and his corrupt DOJ. What is on display is black violence and crminality and incompetence.
There is a tragedy. It’s the people whose homes, cars, businesses, and even, apparently, lives have been destroyed by rioters who were incited by an irresponsible press.
Morality? Are you sure you want to go there? Is it immoral that the unarmed people being shot by police are mostly being done so based upon how they look? Is it immoral to ignore that and not try to do something about it? Is it immoral, as in the piece that Andy links to, that no cops are ever indicted for bad shootings in some states?
“violent black thug robbed a convenience ”
I thought it was established that the cop did not know this when he stopped the kid? Not true?
Query- Why do I always see black criminals referred to as thugs and not so much for white criminals?
Steve
I care more for the living than for the dead. Treating the people of Ferguson as grist for the mill of some putative greater good is deeply immoral.
Steve. Re: this thread and the last
I’d read or listen to the grand jury testimony especially concerning the revolver discharge in the car and the blood path trail.
As for sympathetic descriptions, do YOU really want to go there? Seriously?
Steve, Wilson realized that Brown fit the description of the person that robbed the convenience store after he told him to get out of the road. That’s when Wilson decided to confront him again and blocked traffic. He also called for backup at that point.
Much of the common narrative of this case has been shown to be wrong, as in the Trayvon Martin case.
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Further, Brown, like Martin, was not killed because of how they looked, but because they started violent confrontation s with armed men. In the case of Brown he HAD to know.
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@Bob Sykes: Yes, it is tragic Mike Brown is dead. Strong armed petty theft isn’t cause to be killed.
Just like Trayvon Martin didn’t deserve to die for his infractions.
But in both cases they initiated violence, and when violence occurs the chances for bad outcomes rise dramatically. They gambled, stupidly, and lost. A tragic lose for them and their families.
That said, neither Zimmerman nor Wilson deserved legal punishment for their actions, based on what was presented to the courts.
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That said, I have no sympathy for Brown’s step-father, who was calling by for his own community to be destroyed. Congratulations, dumb fuck, you got your wish, and now your working class neighborhood is headed straight to ghetto-ville.
Schuler, everyone is simply grist for the mill.
“I care more for the living than for the dead.”
And you realize nothing has changed to stop minorities from being shot by police, or more broadly, police from shooting as many people as they do? Those still living have to worry that they can be shot. In every individual case it always seems to work out that somehow it was justified, even though the person shot was unarmed or carrying a toy gun or whatever. Yet, somehow the police are much less likely to make the same mistakes when they are dealing with people who are not minorities. But, to be fair, not much happens when they shoot anyone of any color.
“Just like Trayvon Martin didn’t deserve to die for his infractions.”
What infractions? In Martin’s case, he was walking home from the store. He may have initiated the final violence, we don’t really know, but he clearly did not initiate the contact between the two of them that night. He did not start following Zimmerman. In Brown’s case, it is also pretty clear that the cop did not handle this correctly from the start. Whether through poor training, cockiness or whatever, his initial actions were wrong. Brown likely started the initial violence, but it should not have gotten that far. Not over an unarmed convenience store robbery.
Steve
Punching someone is an infraction in my book, and something I don’t typically do.
As for initiating the contact – that’s a bullshit standard. If I say “hi” to someone, that’s initiating contact, and it doesn’t give them the right to bounce my head on the pavement.
And while I agree that Wilson handled the situation badly (the proof is in the final result), attacking a police officer is plain stupid, and often suicidal. How it is you think that’s okay eludes me.
Another point, one that I would think a doctor with time in an emergency room would appreciate: a grown man can do a LOT of damage to another human being while unarmed. See, for example, most boxing matches, mms fights, etc. Brown was in a reckless and violent frame of mind according to Dorian Johnson’s testimony, as the video tape from the convenience store also demonstrates.
Not to mention that at least some witnesses corroborate Wilson’s account that Brown charged him at the last. (There’s some forensic evidence suggestive of that as well, but it isn’t conclusive.) Was the officer supposed to just wrestle with him at that point?
I agree that officers discharge their weapons in a dangerous manner too often. I can think of four cases from recent years in central Florida off the top of my head. In three of the four cases someone died, in two of those three the person killed was a complete innocent. (One white male, one Hispanic female; a black male car thief died in the other event.) Interestingly, of these four, the officer/s were only found at fault in the case in which no one was shot.
But there haven’t been protests over these matters, and only a little fuss. White male pizza delivery men haven’t rioted, and pretty young female Hispanic club goers haven’t looted. And even the black male car thieves haven’t burnt down any businesses, though one tried to last night.
What I still don’t understand is:
(A) Why the rallying around the worst cases that can be found? And
(B) Why destroying one’s own neighbors and neighborhood is the path of choice for getting back at The Man?
But no one on the anti-police pro-looter side has explained that to me, other than to make dubious claims about innocent black men, and make ludicrous appeals to anger.
#fail , as the kids sometimes write….
Seriously, if this is a race war, blacks have lost both the battles of Ferguson, and whites had to do nothing but pull back and broadcast the results while Anderson Cooper smirked.*
* Not even looking for it, I keep coming across accounts from people that thought CNN’s coverage was particularly egregious. It’s a shame that the reporters working the street got buried by the asshole anchors, “experts”, commentators, director s & producers.
@Icepick
I do not know why you and others bother arguing with rich white liberals. If you increase the percentage of blacks around them high enough, they will don their Klan robes. They have no use for black people.
The reason they encourage unrest in black majority areas is because they will never live there. The police that keep the minorities out of their communities are using the same policing tactics, but they complain. For the most part, they have let black people know to stay the hell out of their communities.
Do you think Jon Stewart would rather live next to a gang banger with a bumper eating dog or a rich white racist?
This is all a sideshow to keep you from seeing the reality. It is no different than income inequality. They create income inequality, and they benefit from it. Then, they blame everybody else for it. Racial problems are the same.
“Mr. Rich White Liberal tear down that wall.”
My own neighbors with a bumper-eating dog was PR, with a trashy white baby momma, but point taken.
As for why I do it? Reflex & bad habit, plain & simple.
“And you realize nothing has changed to stop minorities from being shot by police, or more broadly, police from shooting as many people as they do? “
Steve,
Around the same time Ferguson was in the headlines there were other shootings involving tragedies of young men dying at the hands of police figures. One was a young black man shot as he was running out of a building, failing to halt when told to by a black off-duty cop. The other was a white teen killed in his car, by a hail of bullets from white cops. These were equally violent law enforcement-related deaths to the one in Ferguson. However, the national media wasn’t riveted on them, nor did the WH and DOJ personally inject themselves in these or any number of other tragedies occurring all over the country. Why?
Also, why have some people been so determined to believe emotionally charged testimonies before the autopsy/lab results were in, and all the accounts from people had been analyzed and compared to the forensic evidence that was gathered, unadulterated by any witness bias?
Extracted from the thousand-plus pages of testimonies, data etc. laid in the hands of the Grand Jury, was evidence of extreme intimidation going on following this shooting. Some of the unnamed witnesses said they were too afraid to tell the truth as they had been warned by others not to talk to the police. Flyers were even posted around saying as much. Those who did break rank with the street creed, choosing to openly testify in front of the Grand Jury, relayed accounts consistent with Wilson’s version of what happened, as well as what was physically rendered from the 3 separate autopsies done. Why is it that such factual consistencies, associated with these witnesses, are continually dismissed as being ‘fabricated,’ while the rampant, wildly inconsistent stories are held as true and rationalized as the basis for terrorizing Ferguson store owners and other cities across the nation?
Where is the merit or legitimacy in accepting hyperbolic public ranting and raving, in lieu of what many, if not most, legal scholars described as an above-and-beyond, in-dept analysis of an event by a Grand Jury? Or, has the legal system now evolved to where the herd mentality of a crowd’s predetermined convictions trump anything derived from the honest scrutiny of evidence, collaborated by descriptions from people demonstrating more accuracy in their accounts of what really transpired that evening?
steve, you really should go back and look at the crime statistics in Ferguson. They have between a half dozen and a dozen homicides there a year and as far as I can tell this is the first time a cop has ever killed somebody there. It’s not as though the Ferguson police are going around randomly shooting people.
Yeah, sure, it hasn’t been that bad before, but it is now getting INFINITELY WORSE! Thus, racism!