RE: Fatal shooting of Rayshard Brooks
June 16, 2020 at 6:38 am
(This post was last modified: June 16, 2020 at 7:24 am by The Grand Nudger.)
-and they'll have an entire mess of civil and criminal complaints boosted in the process. In neither scenario is a person allowed to run from the police, but that's small potatoes compared to what's at stake on the issue of tazers. Cops are absolutely empowered to threaten life, with guns or with tazers. However, tazers are commonly employed when shooting someone would not be justifiable.
If it turns out that the police would like to save a murderer-in-blue by claiming that the use of a tazer and the use of a firearm are equivalent examples of force - they're shooting their own dicks off.
They're going to go with Brick Hands McHostage Taker The Dangerous Drunk who got what was coming - because they don't want to have to stop tazing the shit out of people. They would prefer to lie, and peddle racist tropes in the process, than stop tazing people, or, for that matter, stop shooting people.
This is a good time to pause and explain institutional and systemic racism, with the example above. Individual racism, if the cop in question had a hood in his closet, is overt and easily recognized. Institutional racism is subtle and often an artifact of some other respectable process or force, particularly in social or political institutions.
The racism involved here is not the point, not the end goal. It is not overt. It's just an instrument through which law enforcement can maintain some tool it finds useful in it's duties. In that law enforcement finds it useful in so many ways and so many contexts, despite it (allegedly) never being the point, it becomes systemic.
That's why it's pointless on the one hand to look for a klan hood in the officers closet - he's not personally doing all that shit...and otoh, why the system the officer works for literally is the hood in his closet. That system has to kill a man twice, first in body, and then in character - in order to maintain the status quo.
If it turns out that the police would like to save a murderer-in-blue by claiming that the use of a tazer and the use of a firearm are equivalent examples of force - they're shooting their own dicks off.
They're going to go with Brick Hands McHostage Taker The Dangerous Drunk who got what was coming - because they don't want to have to stop tazing the shit out of people. They would prefer to lie, and peddle racist tropes in the process, than stop tazing people, or, for that matter, stop shooting people.
This is a good time to pause and explain institutional and systemic racism, with the example above. Individual racism, if the cop in question had a hood in his closet, is overt and easily recognized. Institutional racism is subtle and often an artifact of some other respectable process or force, particularly in social or political institutions.
The racism involved here is not the point, not the end goal. It is not overt. It's just an instrument through which law enforcement can maintain some tool it finds useful in it's duties. In that law enforcement finds it useful in so many ways and so many contexts, despite it (allegedly) never being the point, it becomes systemic.
That's why it's pointless on the one hand to look for a klan hood in the officers closet - he's not personally doing all that shit...and otoh, why the system the officer works for literally is the hood in his closet. That system has to kill a man twice, first in body, and then in character - in order to maintain the status quo.
I am the Infantry. I am my country’s strength in war, her deterrent in peace. I am the heart of the fight… wherever, whenever. I carry America’s faith and honor against her enemies. I am the Queen of Battle. I am what my country expects me to be, the best trained Soldier in the world. In the race for victory, I am swift, determined, and courageous, armed with a fierce will to win. Never will I fail my country’s trust. Always I fight on…through the foe, to the objective, to triumph overall. If necessary, I will fight to my death. By my steadfast courage, I have won more than 200 years of freedom. I yield not to weakness, to hunger, to cowardice, to fatigue, to superior odds, For I am mentally tough, physically strong, and morally straight. I forsake not, my country, my mission, my comrades, my sacred duty. I am relentless. I am always there, now and forever. I AM THE INFANTRY! FOLLOW ME!
