Police Shootings About Class As Well As Race

[JEB]

by
Jesse Jackson

http://www.commondreams.org/views/2015/08/12/police-shootings-about-class-well-race

While African-Americans are at disproportionate risk from the structural and human biases of our criminal justice system, we should not forget that working and poor people of all races suffer from police excessive use of force. Police kill more whites than blacks. Of the 700 killings it has recorded, the Guardian reports that 340 were white, 179 black and 101 Hispanic. The Post reports that African-American men were 40 percent of the unarmed deaths, but whites and Hispanics made up the majority. The system has a class bias as well as a race bias. An investigation by Alternet’s Zaid Jilani revealed that in the first five months of this year, 95 percent of police killings occurred in neighborhoods with median family incomes under $100,000. There were no killings in neighborhoods with median family incomes of $200,000 or above.

Not surprisingly, lower-income whites are more likely to say police abuse of authority is on the rise than middle- or upper-income whites.

Excessive force puts white lives at risk, as well as those of blacks and Hispanics. But the silence of the white community and of the white church is deafening. The victims of police abuse are left to seek justice on their own.

We need people of conscience in the white community to join with the growing movement grounded in the African-American community to demand reform. Too often, police don’t live in the communities they patrol. They are armed to the teeth, but often receive too little training in how police can help build a community rather than simply occupy it.
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Brings what Martin Niemöller said to mind.


"First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.

Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me."

[Blecht]

1. This is exactly where MLK, Jr. was going

This is exactly where MLK, Jr. was going right before he was murdered.

[Gormy Cuss]

2. Well yes, and the white community is silent because it's divorced from its "others"

in the same way that it's divorced from POC communities,. Low income and blue collar white people are bringing down the white race in the minds of many whites of means.

The number of whites killed is higher, but the ratio is significantly lower. IOW, it's a very real problem in lower income white communities but it's not as much of a problem in the white community as a whole.

It used to be that whites denigrated some of their lot because of ethnicity or faith as well, but these days those taboos are pretty much gone. The one group left are the poor and struggling.