Interesting comment on the militarization of our police (posted on Crookedtimber.org).

“If officers are soldiers, it follows that the neighborhoods they patrol are battlefields. And if they’re working battlefields, it follows that the population is the enemy. And because of correlations, rooted in historical injustice, between crime and income and income and race, the enemy population will consist largely of people of color, and especially of black men. Throughout the country, police officers are capturing, imprisoning, and killing black males at a ridiculous clip, waging a very literal war on people like Michael Brown.”

I'm seeing this kind of framing garbage in the comments sections of my friends' FB posts. It's insidious. I like what you say about exceptionalism. Bella Abzug once said of the women's rights movement (roughly) that "Our goal is not to make sure that a brilliant woman physicist can be an assistant professor, our goal is to make sure that a woman schlemiel can rise as high as a male schlemiel." The Ferguson police have been trying hard to show that Mike Brown was not exceptional, and thus cut off white empathy. It's a sad comment to see how willing so many whites are so eager to lap it right up.

There is a cultural sickness at play here. It actually makes me feel dirty which is why I don't do Facebook, read online comment sections beyond what is necessary, etc. I have had lots of my white friends tell me they had no idea how bat shit crazy and racist their relatives, friends, and colleagues were until Obama got elected. One of my former colleagues said that he knew that his brother was a Republican, but he had no idea how racist he was. And they were raised together by the same parents in the same household.

I don't use Republican---I use "RethugliKKKan." I can barely get 2-3% of white AmeriKKKans to accept that the Transatlantic slave trade between ca. 1500-ca.1800 was the most vicious and systematically, long-term genocidal violation of the human rights of a specific targeted group in the last 4,000-5,000 years of human history. Calling it a cultural sickness even makes it sound too nice. What's really at play is that mainstream white AmeriKKKan society is deeply and pathologically psychotic in the high level of cognitive dissonance and the total lack of moral concern or moral imagination for black life---especially the lives of young black males.

I was watching C-SPAN earlier today about Fergusion. I did not get to see the whole program. Three of the callers discussed how communities of color are targeted by police and how police brutality against Blacks is an ongoing thing, and that Ferguson is just the latest. Three other callers were White supremacists, one a racist Cuban calling from Miami. They kept saying that the cops were doing their jobs, and that witnesses who said that Michael Brown was in a surrendering position when he was shot are lying. One of these callers said he Googled the case and that a Black eyewitness claimed that Brown attacked the officer and that he ignored demands to stop, and that he continued to lunge at the officer when he was shot. This racist idiot said, This big kid was coming at him. Is the cop supposed to let him beat him up? He did what he was supposed to do! I wonder which one of these sources this fool Googled:

http://theconservativetreeh...

http://www.brennerbrief.com...

http://americannews.com/bre...

I need to watch that...I will not be surprised but again it shows the cultural sickness at work here. The Right-wing media is getting its propaganda machine spinning--law and order and racism and dead Negroes are their decision rule.

Yup.

Seriously,fuck the Conservative Treehouse---this is the same racist right-wing site that went out of its way to smear the hell out of Trayvon Martin, trying to prove that he was a thug and accusing his parents of being negligent, despite having no real proof of either of these things. Bottom line, whether Brown shoplifted from the store or not, that is not even the reason he was stopped (the police chief even said that the officer did not know about Brown's having supposedly stolen something.) According to Brown's friend, it sounds like the officer had a bad attitude that day and was taking it out on the first black person he saw.

Here's an article about how some of the Ferguson officers originally came from a police force in Jennings, Missouri, that was actually disbanded because they had a number of

racial harrassment lawsuits against them:

http://www.huffingtonpost.c...

Seems like these officers had carte blanche to do whatever the hell they wanted to a black person, so Officer Wilson's doing what he did to Brown seems to be just an extension of these racist as hell attitudes.

As always a well done piece. "Color arousal" (I first heard of on the Field Negro site) is a prominent feature of this "cultural sickness" you speak of in your article. I remember a relative whom as an elderly person years ago spoke of "resistance" as being a necessary and ongoing aspect of black life. He further cited that many of us have grown group weary and have become a part of the status quo. They must be resisted as well. Daunting indeed!

Thanks for the kind words. Wish I didn't have to keep talking about these matters. Disturbing.

I was out at a lunch with coworkers during a training session this week and CNN was on in the background. The scenery was about Missouri and they were anticipating President Obama to speak about ISIS as well as Missouri.

The headline was, President expected to address Iraq, Missouri unrest. Like the two were related and on the same level of magnitude and just, ugh..

I pointed out that the tear gas scenes and everything were from Missouri and my coworkers were SHOCKED and aghast. I mean, if you're paying attention to things like these, you shouldn't be surprised.

I did my best to explain what happened and how the were over reacting and heavily militarized, but people are just too damn busy in their personal and professional lives to understand this shit unless they make a concerted effort to be present about political and social news.

how do you get the silent majority to show up, listen and pay attention, and then speak up?

The silent majority, in my opinion are at the least racially resentful and at the worst old school racists who have learned to hide it. That phrase re: Right-wing politics as you know has a long history of misrepresenting reality. I just saw the author Nixonland give a talk here in Chicago on his new book about Reagan. His interlocutor was Garry Wills. Both were damn frank and straight about white conservative racism in a way that surprised me.

Wills went hard and said how there are still lots of conservatives who use the word "nigger", hate Dr. King, and have just learned how to be polite in public. I looked at one of the other 2 black people there and we smiled at his telling the truth. The rest of the crowd was shocked.

I've always liked Mr. Wills---his writings on Reagan were always excellent. And to me, Reagan basically is pure evil. Perlstein's Nixonland is also a great book---Nixon's 1972 campaign (where he had to compete against the likes of open segregationists like Wallace) was the real beginning of the intense white racist backlash that only has been growing in intensity even as the overall population is browning....

Wills didn't seem to have much love for Reagan either. I need to go read more of his work.

Wills, while certainly disliking Reagan, wrote this excellent cultural history of the Reagan years called "Reagan's America: Innocents at Home." http://www.amazon.com/Reaga...

I remember some of his stuff from when I was in college and high school. I was struck by how he didn't give a damn about how folks may respond to what he said. I told myself when I am in my 70s or 80s I am going to not give a damn like him. Was great to see their convo.

Also, I love your blog and I love hearing your frequent appearances on Mike Papantonio's "Ring of Fire" program. Keep up what you're doing.

Kind words. More coming on that front.

As I am writing this the autopsy report is in by independent doctor Michael Baden. He concluded that Michael Brown was shot at least 6 times. I'm not sure if I'm down with the celebrity pathologist. But of course it was the family's decision. The only thing I'm going to say about this topic tonight is watch the media do...as it always does. They will take every bit of irrational, unreasonable, insane, nonsensical excuses of the police, and make it logical.. This is what they do, EVERY TIME! When there was video tape of Rodney King being pummeled by police, you were told because he was moving... as he was being struck, he was therefore resisting. In other words it wasn't the video tape, it was your lying eyes. Furthermore, they invited George Zimmerman's attorney, Mark O;Mara, on CNN and allowed him to paint Trayvon Martin as a thug. Never mind he was no such thing. When Zimmerman was acquitted, they hired the ghoul faced O'Mara as a legal analyst.

Now you just watch people of Warnville.

You also want t olisten to the St. Louis dispatch audio of just after the shooting.(The release of that audio by Anonymous may have been what prompted the local PD to admit that WIlsn knew nothing about the "robbery that they claim occured before the shooting.) The audio is still up on Youtube, I think. At any rate it needs to be disseminated as widely as possible before it is inevitably removed.
The autopsy shows that the last bullet entered through the back of his head at the hairline and exited out the right eye. It alsosays the wounds on his arms are consistent with someone fleeing or rasing their arms.
At any rate it may all be moot as Wilson has fled and will probably nebver be arrested for what he did. Iwould be very shocked if he decided to turn himself in and face judgment.

I'm trying to maintain a legit timeline of the initial events. I'm not interested in playing detective with Mike Brown's autopsy reports and whatever surveillance videos have been released.

Mike Brown was clearly not an immediate danger to Darren Wilson from over 30 feet away and having no weapons.

If the Anonymous recording of police dispatch is correct, then immediately following Brown's death the Ferguson police dept demanded an over-the-top security response instead of reporting the incident in the regular manner.

That exact day! according to this time stamp on twitter, armored vehicles were rolling into Ferguson. How are people going to respond to an immediate presence of riot police and armored vehicles in their neighborhood intentionally pointing their guns at them and praying that they start something?

Now there are pro-cop rallies to support Darren WIlson. Where are the riot police to control the crowd?

Thanks for the info Myshkin. Here is the link:
https://www.youtube.com/wat...

Here are Excerpts:

ST. LOUIS COUNTY POLICE DISPATCH AUDIO TAPES, AUGUST 9TH 2014 11:05 AM - 6:05 PM, INCIDENT IS REPORTED AS "CROWD CONTROL PROBLEM" AT 12:05PM, NO SHOOTING MENTIONED UNTIL IT IS CALLED IN TO DISPATCH BY WITNESS. FERGUSON PD DENIES IT KNEW ANYTHING AT THAT TIME. NO EMS WAS CALLED.

EXCERPTS:

9:35: "Ferguson is asking for assistance with crowd control . . ."

10:58: "Now they have a large group gathering there, she doesn't know any further. . ."

11:20: "We just got another call stating it was an officer-involved shooting . . ."

11:30: "Be advised, this information came from the news . . ."

11:55:
"We're just getting information from the news and we just called
Ferguson back again and they don't know anything about it . . ."

20:00: ". . .destruction of property . . ."

21:55: "They are requesting more cars. Do you want me to send more of your cars?"

43:55:
"Attention all cars, be advised that in reference to the call 2947 Canfield Drive, we are switching over to the riot channel at this time .
. ."
________________________________________

­­______

The corporate media lies. I'm watching Ferguson live on livestream.com

Oldie but a goodie:
https://www.youtube.com/wat...

Thanks for posting those links, Kokanee.

Yeah, even to this day you see comments online by racist idiots claiming Martin was a thug, even though he had NO criminal record at all, and Zimmerman is the one with the known history/police record of domestic assault, assaulting a police officer, racial harassment of a co-worker (you can find that co-worker's testimony about that online) and most recently, arrested for pulling a shotgun on his ex-girlfriend. Yet Martin is still considered the thug, even though he was the victim! And now Micheal Brown is going through the same demonization process, simply because he was a big young black man! As if there mere act of shoplifting justified his getting shot---why the officer even felt the need to do that in the first place isn't adressed by those idiot racists who believe that.

Excellent post! The subject of separating the "exceptional negro specimen" from average (and collective) black Americans is a neglected topic that needs more attention. Another piece of the puzzle.

Take a picture of this political cartoon: Bill Cosby yelling at a black kid from sidelines, "Come on kid! Pull yourself up by the bootstraps!" Meanwhile, the kid is pinned under the boot of a white giant. Label the white foot with whatever you deem appropriate.

"I'm not a racist. I support Ben Carson for president and he's black." fits right into the white gaze and white supremacy frame.

Cornel West for president!

The authentic "looking glass self" is a reflection of ourselves. We look at another person and see our very self and thereby gain empathy as in "there but for the grace of god go I." This process is short circuited when one reflexively engages in "niggerization," whereby a negative stereotype is substituted for a genuine mirror image. It amounts to deliberate self delusion; to self imposed stupefication, dumb-ization, hatred, self and collective destruction.

Projection is very powerful both individually and collectively. How to unlearn its negative aspects?

The human race is hardwired for altruism, inclusion, and empathy as a matter of evolutionary adaptation. Due to a series of historical accidents humanity has embraced egoism, exclusion, indifference, and hostility. As Neil deGrass Tyson and so many others have proven, said short sightedness is threatening our very survival. We can only hope that the survival imperative will shock us out of our complacency. Like Irving Goffman said "nothing focuses the mind more that the knowledge that he'll be executed in a fortnight;" the point being that survival is a mighty motivator, more effective than mere moral outrage. The necessity of education for survival is palpable.

As usual, thank you for these hard hitting truthful posts.

Thank you for sharing them. We got to keep putting one foot in front of the other. We also need to translate our commentary into action on the ground too.

Is that why he took his learning French sabbatical? I hope he is back and recharged. Rand Paul's words on these matters have no credibility given that he wouldn't have supported the Voting or Civil Rights Acts.

Talk about critical self-reflection. Real talk.