Posted on 11/27/2014 4:23:05 AM PST by Kaslin
“As a black man, I was disappointed in the grand jury’s decision.”
This was one of the first sentences I heard from talk radio callers Tuesday morning, less than twelve hours after the announcement that Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson would not be indicted.
The gentleman’s first four words are a perfect indicator of the worst racial problems we face in 2014. He observed the story not through facts or evidence, but through the lens of his own blackness.
His ethnicity, not testimony heard by the grand jury, guided his opinion on a case that cried out for objectivity and even-handedness.
But those commodities are under attack in an era of race-baiting that encourages self-absorption and the stoking of ancient grievances.
When the Barack Obamas and Eric Holders of the world step out to tell us we have much work to do on race, they are right. But the racial progress we need to make is nothing like what they envision. Even Holder’s claim of national cowardice on race is correct. But he sees us as failing to recognize that America is still a racist cauldron, insufficiently matured past the 1950s. The truth is that we do not have the courage to face the real lessons of Ferguson— the real obstacles to the racial progress we should be making in the 21st century.
So here are those lessons, as important now as the lessons we learned through the civil rights heyday of the 1960s. There was an urgency in the era of Dr. King, stemming from the growing belief that we labored under a pathology of racism that needed to be cured if we were to consider ourselves a decent society.
Today’s racial poisons spring from two sources— misplaced aggression in a black community blind to racial progress, and craven opportunism from liberals of all colors who delight in the portrayal of America as a nation still in need of scolding and government-enforced corrections. The first lesson: Large slices of black America are willfully blind to the year we live in.
When I see street thugs and rich TV pundits sharing the opinion that white supremacy is on the loose, that is not a political assertion, it s a mental illness, a blind spot to the amazing racial progress of just the last few decades. Only a stark perceptual disorder can lead someone to regard the current landscape as filled with racist white cops on the prowl for black kids to shoot.
The second lesson: Black racist hatred of white cops is cut from the same evil cloth as any white racism. Imagine a white man concluding without evidence that black youth are just looking for that next victim to mug. Imagine that man seeing a group of young black men, presuming they are criminals merely because of their blackness. Even though examples can be found of black criminal behavior, we would scold this man for jumping to racist conclusions.
This is precisely the type of racism directed at white cops in the inner city. Its logic: A white face plus a badge must mean brutality is about to happen. We have chased stereotyping of blacks into the dank attitudinal caves where it belongs. Now we need voices to stigmatize black racist disregard of the police. The third lesson: Fueled by this hate, some black witnesses will effortlessly lie if asked about a white police shooting of a black suspect. The Ferguson grand jury saw multiple examples of testimony wholly contradicted by the physical evidence. This reflexive dishonesty may be a result of purposeful deception designed to balance the scales of historic oppression, or a sincere error based on a common human weakness: seeing what we wish to see. In either event, it is an epidemic that threatens the black community’s journey toward enlightenment.
The fourth lesson: That journey of enlightenment must be driven from within the black community. Racist whites of fifty years ago needed more than lectures from black leaders; they needed to see their fellow whites casting off racist attitudes, joining the ranks of decency and justice.
Today, black pastors and political leaders are the ones who must patiently and caringly mold the bent perceptions of those who labor under the falsehood that white racism, in or out of a police uniform, is their worst problem.
Statistics show that black America is in far greater danger from a black criminal neighbor than from any white cop. If the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter is really true, we must start paying attention to the societal ills that are the real cause of black victimization.
The fifth lesson: America’s current national leadership is failing to deliver these vital messages. Democrats fail to lead because they wish to stoke the racial discontents that keep them in power. Republicans fail to lead out of fear that it will seem racist to address these matters. With no one in public life, certainly not the likes of predatory antagonists like Al Sharpton, encouraging goodwill and calm, it is no wonder that directionless populations default to the hatreds of the street.
The sixth lesson: Changing this sad status quo will be hard, because a racially healed America is bad news for many.
It is bad news for a media culture that thrives on racial discontent, to the point of whipping it up in environments where it is not justified.
It is bad news for politicians like Obama and Holder, because it unplugs their narrative of a sick America that needs social justice prescriptions only they can write.
It is bad news for opportunists who may have to get day jobs if the marketplace for riot-mongering dries up.
It is bad news for idle souls who lean on the crutch of white racism as an excuse for why they cannot be as productive as millions of their black brothers and sisters who have long since stopped whining about “the man.”
These are the lessons of Ferguson you will never hear from Barack Obama, Michael Eric Dyson or the white guilt trip cult at MSNBC. But if we do not learn these lessons, we will only have more Fergusons and more national tantrums to follow, because there will indeed be future white cops shooting future black people.
Sometimes the shooting will be unjustified. Sometimes it will result in a grand jury indictment, and a conviction if warranted. If that happens, justice will be done.
But for millions of Americans, justice in Ferguson was not being measured by its usual standards, as in an examination of the evidence. For mobs in the streets and pundits on network studio sets, the bar of justice was set only at the delivery of a white cop’s head on a platter, no matter what happened the night of Michael Brown’s shooting.
That is the racial sickness of today. The sad thing is that even as Selma protesters were hosed and beaten in 1965, American attitudes were on the threshold of evolving in short order into a wisdom that would not allow such things to ever happen again.
Where is the wisdom that will reform today’s racist haters of white cops? Where is the President who will support our system of justice rather than take political sides even when the system has spoken? Where is the media culture that will show restraint in an attempt to foster logic and reason?
In the absence of these things, our journey toward mature and healthy race relations will be prolonged and painful. But we must never tire. We must overcome.
The whole thing just grows curiouser and curiouser. I'd suspect that Vince McMahon wrote the script, except he's not a lib.
The real lesson of Ferguson is that 13.5% of the population ordinarily would not have a major impact on the rest of America. It only does because of the MSM ghouls and misery panderers and politicians.
We empower the dialogue of these few by listening to it and following it in the news. Isolate it, demonize it, and then discount it —Alinsky.
If the rest of America wants to know the lesson and what to do about it, google the 2010 census and search for % of blacks distribution by county and choose (if you can) your home territory carefully. I did in 2002.....1% in my county....there were absolutely no protests here about the Gentle Giant.
Guess what?I don’t care any more.
My goal is to live in communities that are nearly entirely white and to be in the company of whites as much as possible.
I am also changing the locations I use for shopping, opting for nearly entirely White clientele and employees/owners. Since I am almost always alone, I ordinarily mind my surroundings, too, but I don’t want to increase the chance I could be blindsided.
Doing that would be considered "acting White".
Excellent article. Thanks for posting.
I haven't owned a home since 1992. I'm exhausted from all the rioting and looting. My apartment looks like the lair of Smaug.
To me, herd mentality is a proctective mechanism animals use to maximize the safety of the herd.
This is a feral mob mentality, every thug for himself. As in touch the flatscreen I just stole and I’ll put a cap in yo a**.
Blacks make up 13 percent of the population but committ over 50 percent of the murders. Over 90 percent of the murders committed by blacks are against other blacks.
Good point. The thug was a 300 pound adult that had just robbed a liquor store and committed assault and battery.
Some kid.
I've read many comments on lib websites from people who identified as black calling Brown a "baby," and racist, white cops were shooting their "babies" for no reason whatsover. How divorced from reality are you when you refer to a 6'4, 290 lb 18-year old as a baby?
1) No amount of evidence would have prevented the black thug population from using the death of the 300 pound adult thug as a pretext for additional crimes.
2) All the race baiters from Obama to Sharpton claim police shootings are the cause of America's high black body count when the real cause is other blacks committing murder against other blacks.
3) Depending on the city, blacks commit crimes at a rate of 7 to 10 times the rate whites do.
4) Liberals spend their time spotlighting white racism (real or imagined) as an all-purpose explanation for bad black outcomes, giving a pass to criminal thug blacks for all the crimes and murders they commit.
5) Pretending police behavior is the root of the problem is not only false, but foolish and dangerous. When you make police targets, you make low income neighborhoods much less safe.
6) It is the thug behavior of criminal blacks that is is the real problem.
OK - I am done for now.
I don’t give to organizations here because every time I watch the giveaways on the news there is nobody there to receive the giveaways except blacks and Hispanics. Last night they showed a Thanksgiving dinner box giveaway and I told Hubby....oh my god!! All the people they are showing walking away with the boxes are white!!
He said....it was north of the river.
We have a small, rather poor, community north of our river that is predominantly white.
I wonder what impressions people are forming, what fears are being confirmed, by watching something like Ferguson, where it's hard for many to understand rioting and tearing/burning down a community because what appears to be a big, street thuggish dude robbed a store, assaulted a cop while fighting for his gun, then charged the cop with intent and was killed for it...because the cop is white?!?
Every possible fear and negative impression ever formed about black America is reinforced by what is shown on TV and by trying to wrap your mind around its logic. That Ferguson comes after Trayvon and a knockout game summer is even more negative reinforcement, but now raised to a higher level.
So, back to the job interviews. If the employer has been watching the news, are you, young black man or woman, going to be seen as you are?
Or will you instead be seen via the impressions that have been formed/reinforced about "black" thanks this time to Ferguson?
If so, what does that mean for you if the employer has many diverse applicants to choose from?
From this point of view, you can see how normal people like us, regardless of color, people who just want a job or just want to hire someone of quality to help us do the work we want to do, are being made to carry this "baggage" of negative, false impressions, all in the name of community agitation and for the profitable glory of some political power.
The only place you can pile on garbage like this and out comes gold is on a compost pile, not on a constituency group.
This same divisive, community agitator garbage doesn't work well in the school system either.
Nope, it's the truth that sets us normal people free, not their garbage that keeps our reactions and results chained to bad impressions, thanks to their (and now our) lies that forge each link in that chain.
Will ours be the generation that finally breaks these chains or will their circle remain unbroken?
(with us trapped inside)
When you are up against emotional dismissals of rationality, your only hope of a rational hearing is in court. The principle I advocate is that it is folly to try to take on the small fry, you have to go after the big dog. And the big dog, with all due respect to the damage and danger of having a POTUS who is hostile to you, is journalism.People hear that, and instantly think that the First Amendment is an obstacle to any attack on journalism. But there are limits, some well-recognized, on the problem which the First Amendment presents to addressing libel. And that is what we are all experiencing, systematic libel. Libel of an entire class, and an entire political party. And not libel by a single newspaper, but of effectively all national newspapers, and broadcast radio news and TV news - as well as most cable TV channels.
First, just putting the name “libel” on it shows that it is possible to formulate a court case against it. Second, while the First Amendment codifies deference to “the freedom of . . . the press,” it does not create a class distinction amongst the people. Freedom of the press is a right of the people, not of a class of people. It belongs to you, and it belongs to me. Freedom of the press implies freedom to read journalism as well as the right to write it. It also implies the right to transmit and receive journalism with technologies which represent the fruits of “the progress of science and useful arts,” the promotion of which the Constitution explicitly cites as a part of the Framers' mission.
In addition to the laws of libel, two other laws can impinge on the freedom of journalists - the Sherman Antitrust Act and the law creating the FCC. I have seen the claim on a seemingly serious web site that the Associated Press lost a suit before SCOTUS in 1945 under the Sherman Antitrust Act. On its very face, the AP is an organization to tell all major journalism outlets what the news is.
There is a robust tradition of cooperation among newspapers tracing back to the founding era, when it was quite difficult to transmit the news expeditiously (as we would now consider “expeditiously,” it was impossible), and cooperation and sharing was the norm. But the AP raises that to an entirely different level, and not only solves the “expeditiousness” problem but creates a “Style Guide” for the composition of articles to be carried by the AP. Some of that “style” actually has merit in encouraging more informative and less florid composition. But part of that “style” homogenizes what can be said in an AP story.
It is painfully obvious that journalists have interests which conflict with the public interest. TV cameras love fires, and any sort of destruction because the public cannot but be interested by it. But while it interests people, destruction is patently inimical to the public interest. And yet we are informed - by teachers in school as well as by journalists themselves - that journalists are objective. This is patent nonsense. The claim of “journalistic objectivity” is most similar to claims of papal infallibility applied to secular matters. A newspaper article is composed and printed by people who are not even under oath, and therefore a newspaper article cannot without supporting testimony be dispositive in court.And even if an article be true, it inevitably must be less than the whole truth. And as with all partial tellings, even of truth, “Half the truth is often a great lie.” The usual problem with journalism is what is not said. But what is said is sometimes excruciatingly destructive. The Zimmerman case is an egregious example; NBC synthesized a lie by broadcasting an edited version of Zimmerman’s discussion with a police dispatcher in which an answer and then a question were excised. Blatant dishonesty. But it has to be brought to court properly.
The Zimmerman case is part of an obvious pattern, which now includes the officer Darren Wilson case and the Duke Lacrosse case and - going back a ways - the T’wanna Brawley case, and undoubtedly others which don’t immediately come to mind. Those are nominally - but only nominally - apolitical. For in all such cases, the actual target is much larger than the individual(s) involved. There are also the explicitly political cases - the “Texas Air National Guard Memos” - scare quotes denoting that the documents involved were forgeries - case, the arbitrary transmogrification of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth organization from a group of the people most knowledgeable about the naval experience of John Kerry into “swiftboating” as an unquestionably false narrative, without the intermediate step of actually demonstrating that any of the claims of the organization or its members were false.
Establishment journalism as we know it is a single entity, easily shown to tend to violate the Sherman Antitrust Act, and it manifests a systematic slant against the rank-and-file Republican, and especially the Republican wing of the Republican Party known as the “TEA party.” That animus can be demonstrated. So what? So, the Federal Communications Commission has no right to promote journalism as being objective, or being anything other than a mouthpiece for special interests which profit at the expense of the public interest. There is no need to ask a court to declare conservative voices to be objective, but any court should recognize that the perspective of journalism is not inherently the public interest. Only the Constitution, and laws which are consistent with the Constitution, define the public interest.
The FCC has no right to even consider censoring or “balancing” so-called “conservative” (actually truly liberal) expressions such as the Rush Limbaugh show, et. al. As for the “Federal Elections Commission,” there is no public interest served by it, it is counter to the First Amendment, and all “Campaign Finance Reform” laws should be abolished by SCOTUS and/or Congress. Anyone who opposes the abolition of the FEC or the curtailment of the FCC’s political influence is a Grubercat. An apparatchik.
Every now and then I see it referred to as a “liquor” store. It was a convenience store, and I don’t know why some want it to be a liquor store. What’s up with that?
They’re more humane because they know you’ll enforce peace if they don’t.
In Ferguson, the enforcers did nothing.
You weren’t there, sir, and neither was I. But just from the video of the decedent in the convenience store, your “gentle giant” wasn’t particularly gentle. And I’m wondering why you want to believe that the officer was guilty. Is it because he is white? Is it because he is a police officer?If it’s because he is white, you are a racist.
If it’s because he’s a police officer, you are advocating the dominance of the strong over the weak, the young over the old and the very young, the man over the woman. And you advocate the destruction of the stores in your area which provide things you want, and employ your neighbors.
Either way, you are a real piece of work.
Because If you look at the pictures, the name of the store is
“Ferguson Market and Liquor”
I don’t “want” it to be anything. The fact is it is a store that sells liquor.
Black home ownership had been at higher levels, and that was probably the most assimilated they have been.
Nice; how many flat-screens?
The concept is fairly simple; they would care more for an area if they thought they’d be there for at least a few decades.
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