law-enforcement

What about you? Girlfriend? Wife? Kids? Perhaps a gaggle of towheaded, extra large boys who already excel at sports and know how to make fire with the ass end of a lightning bug?

Can the law get blood out of a stone? I haven't any money.

Only a few days after my encounter with the police, two patrolmen tackled Alton Sterling onto a car, then pinned him down on the ground and shot him in the chest while he was selling CDs in front of a convenience store, seventy-five miles up the road in Baton Rouge. A day after that, Philando Castile was shot in the passenger seat of his car during a police traffic stop in Falcon Heights, Minnesota, as his girlfriend recorded the aftermath via Facebook Live.Then, the day after Castile was killed, five policemen were shot dead by a sniper in Dallas. It felt as if the world was subsumed by cascades of unceasing despair. I mourned for the family and friends of Sterling and Castille. I felt deep sympathy for the families of the policemen who died. I also felt a real fear that, as a result of what took place in Dallas, law enforcement would become more deeply entrenched in their biases against black men, leading to the possibility of even more violence.The stream of names of those who have been killed at the hands of the police feels endless, and I become overwhelmed when I consider all the names we do not know__ll of those who lost their lives and had no camera there to capture it, nothing to corroborate police reports that named them as threats. Closed cases. I watch the collective mourning transpire across my social-media feeds. I watch as people declare that they cannot get out of bed, cannot bear to go to work, cannot function as a human being is meant to function. This sense of anxiety is something I have become unsettlingly accustomed to. The familiar knot in my stomach. The tightness in my chest. But becoming accustomed to something does not mean that it does not take a toll. Systemic racism always takes a toll, whether it be by bullet or by blood clot.

Imagine this garden; one you__e planted from seed, cultivated with love. When the seeds break the ground, they seek sunshine, warmth, and nutrients. The seeds have no control over the weather.They are as dependent on it as we are on our minds. You may have control over the location of your garden, the frequency with which you tend to it, and the amount of care you give it, but you can__ control the weather.It may be sunny one day, rainy the next. You prop the vines in the hopes they will flourish once the rain passes. And they may, until the next rain comes. The weather changes, sometimes without warning. Sometimes you can see it coming, much like the triggers a depressed person avoids, and you try to protect the plants before the storm. The intensity of the labor can get frustrating, especially if there is no relief in sight.One day, a tornado or hurricane passes through. Even though you see it on the horizon, you can__ stop it and you may not be able to seek shelter soon enough. The plants are torn from their roots, the garden completely destroyed. You may have thought you could protect it yourself, that the storm wouldn__ be that bad, or you simply didn__ know how or were afraid to ask for help. Your neighbors and family couldn__ help or didn__ know you needed help. The garden is gone. This is the way of depression; if you don__ have it, it__ very difficult to understand this cycle.

The next significant incident would change Steven forever: an apartment building fire. Steven and another officer arrived to the sounds of the screams of parents desperately trying to find their children. They ran inside believing there were three children trapped; they scooped them up and ran outside with a feeling of elation and relief. They had saved the children from certain death. The feeling was short lived. A frantic mother approached them, __here__ my daughter?__teven and the other officer tried to reenter the building but the fire had become too intense. All they could do was watch in horror as a partial wall of the building collapsed, revealing the child__ location. They could see and hear her, but they couldn__ save her. Her screams were mixed with the screams of her mother. Eventually her screams were silenced and she was no longer visible. Her mother continued to wail in pain, others dropped to their knees and sobbed while the first responders choked back their own tears and finished their jobs, the emotion overwhelming. Every person on the scene was altered that day. A piece of every one of them became part of the ashes.

Domination is a relationship, not a condition; it depends on the participation of both parties. Hierarchical power is not just the gun in the policeman's hand; it is just as much the obedience of the ones who act as if it is always pointed at them. It is not just the government and the executives and the armed forces; it extends through society from top to bottom, an interlocking web of control and compliance. Sometimes all it takes to be complicit in the oppression of millions is to die of natural causes.

Everybody wants to cut off the limb to to deal with the problem. You can__ just keep cutting off limbs and destroying fruit. We have to become committed enough to examine the root. The root of the problem in our community, in our country is a systematic problem. And until all who are a part of the problem admit their role in the problem, we will never have a holistic solution.

This is not a Black problem. It is not a white problem. It is not a police problem. It is a WE problem. We the people, for the people. It is going to take all of us being transparent in order to transform.

The objective for each individual when you are pulled over by an officer of the law is to - Survive the Stop!

A war on cops? Then the question becomes who are they warring with? Because if you look at the prison system you can tell who the Prisoners of War are. The Black Man. Words are powerful and we must stop these divisive words that tare our country further apart instead of bringing us together.

Why are the police REALLY having trouble recruiting officers - especially Black officers? We have to bridge the gap between community and law enforcement.

We all have inherent biases. All of us. The problem occurs when police officers or community members allow those biases to affect the choices they make as they do their job or have interactions with others.

The nature of your outcome or problem in large part depends upon you. The side of the road is not the time, nor is it the place to try to prove to a law enforcement officer whether you are right or wrong. That is what the courtroom is for.This is an excellent example of what can happen when we remove the biases that affect the choices we make whenever these interactions take place. The objective for each individual when you are pulled over by an officer of the law is to - Survive the Stop!

Respect has left our society in so many ways _ we don__ even respect the office of the Commander in Chief as we should. The strength of any building, organization or family must include respect. As a country, as a community, as mothers and fathers _ we must teach and act in a manner that recognizes without this noble profession our society would be in total chaos. Respect that. Period.

It is time to have real conversations. Even in high crime areas _ everybody in that area is not committing crimes. Everybody on the police force is not corrupt. Just like everybody in the hospital is not sick. Everybody in the jailhouse is not an inmate. What America and the media have to stop doing is painting the picture with such a broad stroke. We have to begin to deal with each incident and each individual as that _ an individual incident. Until then, we will continue to have the needless loss of lives and unnecessary force.

Stop reacting to the stereotypes and start responding to the individual.

Law enforcement is hired to enforce the law. You call them in to deal with situations you cannot deal with or do not want to deal with. When they arrive _ let them do their job. You know who you called them for before they got there. Enough said.

Is there a war on cops? Is there a war on the Black man? Who is going to call a cease fire?