"A perfect storm..."

"His black life didn’t seem to matter. But it does."

Charles Blow

"Playtime: 1943" via Shorpy's

I could write...

In Tamir and in others we see the beast we’ve created.
We see how we would react if raised in our privilege subjected to this culture.
And we are frightened by our lack of humanity.

...and again turn this back to us. It's what even "good" whites do.

I could write...

The boy waved a gun.
He refused to comply.
The officer had reasonable fear for his life.
The system works.

...and hide behind lies we tell ourselves about these strange folks who live among us. 

It's what many of "us" do. 

***

Those are the stories we tell ourselves.

Neither story matters, or even makes sense, but we tell them over and over again, because we systematically (in the most fundamental sense of the word) kill those we hate. This one just happened to involve a child (not the first time).

We do not talk much about his sister trapped in the police car, hands cuffed, watching the warmth of her dying brother flow out into the cold Cleveland earth.

We do not talk much about the 4 minutes Tamir lay bleeding on the ground--he got no help until others arrived at the scene.

***

Here's a Swiftian proposal that just might work.

A grand jury's interpretation of "reasonable fear" will always stand in court in a culture where white folks' fears start before the others even enter our field of vision.

Once a suspect person of color is disabled by a few rounds fired from a couple of feet away, reasonable fear no longer holds. None. Lynchings were once a family past time.

From The Red Record (Project Gutenberg)

Require that officers personally render assistance to those they incapacitate:

• That means laying your hands over the wounds, feeling the warmth of life ooze through your fingers, as you  staunch the bleeding.
• That means laying hands on a dying child's chest to do chest compressions if necessary.
• That means laying your hands on a monster as it morphs back into human form as your "reasonable fear" ebbs into nothingness.

Make the penalties severe for failure to comply--mandatory time.

That means if you're going to shoot a monster, you're going to have to touch a human. 

Check your privilege (at the door)

Dear White Person,

Welcome to our blog. I'm about as pale and male as they come. I've worked on the docks, in medicine, in education, in sales, in lawn care, and every step along the way I attributed any success to hard work and a little bit of luck™. Bet you've worked hard, too--and maybe had a little bit of luck™ as well.

Or maybe not--maybe those other folk got the job you could have had. You'll have a chance to share your stories on that later. The if-only-my-name-was... tales shared when the others are not around.

I carried my social justice card with pride--my folks were involved with the NAACP while we were growing up, I worked the Prince Street projects and at the Lincoln Motel shelter, I live in a neighborhood of color. Heck, I'm even black Irish! Bet you've got your credentials in order, too.

Let's talk!

Our white Jesus

Jesus was not born white.
Neither was my grandfather.

But thanks to the inclusivity of pale folks with power, they're both in the club now.

via BBC News, December 24, 2015

And while liberal aware whites (the LAW) will look for a hint of a micro-expressed smile when we point this out to our black, er, African-Amercan, um, whatever friends, a peek at our treasured family creche shows a baby Jesus with less pigment than Santa.
Because, well, tradition.

The LAW stumbles on what to call you, mostly because you're not white.

Not yet, anyway.