Anti-police protest, City Hall, March 28, 2018 |
"Where's the outrage?" activist Tio Hardiman asked not once but twice. "Where's the outrage? For this 3-year-old that was killed. The same kind of outrage when George Floyd was killed by the police in Minneapolis. There should be 30, 40, 50,000 people on the streets, right now, shutting down the Black community until we get it right. Black men need to shut down the Black community until we get it right."
OK, I’ll bite. Can I fit in 10 thoughts? Let’s try.
1. Did cops kill that 3-year-old too? My hunch is they didn’t. Because the outrage roiling the country is not about the victim, per se, but about living in a nation where a police officer, the representative of law and order, in theory, can leisurely strangle a Black man while his buddies stand guard. That’s what galls, as opposed to the age of the person killed. Though I suppose — I hope — that had the Minneapolis police smothered a toddler, not to give them any ideas, the national outrage would be worse.
2. That question, “Where’s the outrage?” is a cliche, the half-clever way the Fox Nation sorts and their surrogates — not to point any fingers — try to avoid the admittedly slight risk of being drawn into a sincere conversation about racism. “Where’s the outrage?” is Fox Speak for “Fix it yourself.”
3. Holding our noses, let’s dive into my spam folder, where the tone used to describe last weekend’s 104 shootings is between a leering chortle and a blatting raspberry.
“Maybe the credo should be ‘Black Lives Matter — Except in Lawndale, Englewood, Etc.’ Very sad,” begins one, “very sad” being the polite form of Nelson Muntz’s bray of “Ha-ha!”
4. “Black on Black murders. Horrible,” sighs another. “The media ignore it. Not a peep!”
Well, Fox News certainly didn’t ignore it — that’s where I saw Hardiman’s interview. They even have a running logo, “Chicago’s Crime Wave.” The killings were the front page of Monday’s Sun-Times, not to conflate the two. And the Trib: “Outrage after toddler, teen die.” That sorta answers Hardiman’s question, doesn’t it?
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A piece of the BLM movement is the "notion" that people of color suffer at the hands of the police, government policy, lack of resources,economic opportunity and societal norms as well as a lack of effective policing that helps keep their communities safe from violence. Policing in these areas or lack thereof can exacerbate the violence. Not that police, discrimination and oppression are directly to blame for what many refer to as black on black violence but these circumstances foster desperation that leads to senseless violence. As you state the protest against these circumstances have been occurring for years. Very few listened until now. Fucking racists . Victim blaming is one of their primary tools. Shameful continuation of the racist indifference that allows the perpetuation of this dynamic.
ReplyDeletegood points
ReplyDeleteLooking at Mr Hardimans credentials as an activist specifically as a violence interrupter I'd like to hear more of what he has to say. As a white person I feel I need to better understand the messaging of the leaders in communities of color most affected by these circumstances. It's appalling his message was reduced to a soundbite by the network interviewing him
ReplyDeleteYou might find that you and Mr. Hardiman have a lot in common, FME.
DeleteAs with people who complain on Facebook about the media not covering a situation that they somehow magically know about...
ReplyDeleteThank you for pointing out an obvious but all-too-often ignored point about those stupid complaints that the media is "ignoring" this or that. There are persons, some of whom think of themselves as journalists, who have made a career out of cherry-picking incidents of crimes committed by Black people (or immigrants, or whoever else they happen to hate) and stringing them together. These people invariably complain that "the media" are "ignoring" the incidents they reported on, meaning that they don't play them up enough, or use enough racial stereotyping, or God knows what.