Some Readers’ Experiences with Race and Police

When I posted last week about white privilege and the Mike Brown story, I was fascinated as readers relayed their own stories and experiences with racism in the comment section. I want to take a moment to share two of those stories with you.

This is Trinity91’s story:

It isn’t just the south though. It’s all of american culture. The south is just more open about their bigotry. I moved from New Mexico (where things are bad, especially in regard to police brutality) to the suburbs of Seattle (where things are MUCH, MUCH worse) My husband and I (I am white, he is not) specifically chose a diverse neighborhood because we knew it was going to be safer for him and our daughter. I am terrified, not of our neighbors (who are all wonderful people who look out for each other) but of the cops and racist white people who live in nearby neighborhoods.

Here it’s the prejudice, as well as issues with the police. A few months ago I had gone to to grocery store and on my way home the way to my house was blocked by ten cop cars, and one came screeching around me as I’m trying to turn around, stops, and a Swat officer in full riot gear gets out with an automatic rifle, and a bullet belt, goes running down the street, and start shooting. Why? A teenager stole a beer and a bag of chips from the convenience store.

I am none too happy about the state of our police as it stands today. I grew up in a heavily hispanic area. Things weren’t great (drug war stuff going on) but they weren’t as bad as they are now. My old neighborhood is still the same as it always was, which is to say poor, but now police come and ransack houses. People are moving out and the community is dying because of the police violence. My mom moved last year after the cops mistakenly beat down her neighbor’s door and ransacked her house, without a warrant looking for drugs.

And here is BeaverTales’ story:

My father was black, and my mother is mixed Filipino and Ashkenazi Jewish. I have medium dark skin and I grew up considering myself to be black like my dad. My dad used to tell stories at the dinner table about growing up in the South… black men he knew being beaten up and hospitalized, jailed, or harassed for trivial infractions by police…men who were most likely innocent, and some who had openly dated white women. My brother and I grew up with the understanding that if a cop stopped us we should always be deferential and cooperate … beca use if he was a racist, he could ruin our lives or career with a felony conviction…or worse…and he would most likely get away with it. Dad believed that many police officers were gun nuts who are itching for an excuse to pull the trigger. I think a lot of young black men grow up believing that.

I’m a professional with a graduate degree, am usually very clean cut, and have never committed a crime in my life (okay, okay…on a dare I once shoplifted a pack of gum from a grocery store when I was 10 yrs old, something I still feel guilty about to this day, even though I was never caught). Let me be clear on something: I am frightened to death of the police, something that mystifies most of my white friends. They think being afraid of the police is irrational, especially if you have done nothing wrong. Here are some “unusual” things that have happened to me over the years:

*I have had a gun pulled on me by a cop (because the car my uncle was driving was “the same color as a suspect’s car”, even though we bore no resemblance to the purported criminals other than race). A white cop held a loaded gun mere inches from my face for nearly 5 minutes barking accusations and yelling obscenities. I had nightmares about that for years.

*I was once pulled over after driving through an intersection in Chicago as the light went from yellow to red. I was asked to get out of the car, frisked, and then asked to follow the officer in my car to the police station…where I was interrogated further about my job, where I lived, and what my business was in the area. An hour later, I was released with a minor moving violation ticket

*I was once falsely accused of rape by a white woman, and the cops imprisoned me after picking me up because she had described a “well dressed black man” as her assailant…even though I am 100% gay, and was staying at a nearby hotel in St Louis attending a scientific conference. After 2+ hours in police custody, I was released and told the woman was “probably mentally ill”. No apology was ever given.

*I was once given a citation for “endangering a pedestrian” in an unfamiliar upscale California neighborhood, looking for an address of a friend. A cop tailed me for almost 2 miles through winding streets, and I was beginning to panic. A white woman stepped off the curb at a crosswalk just as I pulled up to the stop sign. She smiled and waved me through the crosswalk…something that has happened to me on many occasions, and the cop pulled me over seconds later. Again, with the usual interrogation about why I was in the area.

My brother has similar stories. He once was so upset at the harassment that he lost his temper and kicked a police car, resulting in a misdemeanor and time in jail. I’m grateful that it didn’t escalate beyond that. Even most of my black (especially male) friends all have similar stories. Oddly, none of my white friends (the majority of my adult friendships) do…and when I tell them about these incidents they will sometimes imply that I had to have been doing something unintentionally warranting suspicion…cops just don’t do things like this for no reason. Even today, a white acquaintance told me he has never been similarly mistreated “because I have never committed a crime”.

I’m not surprised at the racial breakdown of opinions over Michael Brown, and differing speculation about what led to the escalation of the confrontation and the subsequent shooting. At times like this, I realize American blacks and whites live in a completely different universe.

I suspect that those of us who are white have been able to ignore what is going on in part because we don’t see it—we don’t live it. But the wages of the War on Drugs, and the continued militarization of what is supposed to be a police force, these things are not new and have been changing the terrain for many Americans for decades now. It’s about time we paid attention and made a concerted effort to support those who are trying to roll this back.