In a message dated 11/4/2003 10:01:09 AM Pacific Standard Time,
the-squeeze at pulpculture.org writes:
>
> a colleague--upstanding, professional, tie-wearing white guy--was
> celebrating the imminent wedding of a friend the other night: it was a
> nightclub for 40 and 50 and 60 somethings. Things got out of hand, the
> bouncers mistook my colleague for someone who had been causing problems,
> they beat him to a pulp. the cops showed up and started kicking him while
> he lay there bleeding and unconscious.
>
> onlookers asked the cop why and he said, "he's just a drunken fool."
So um,I realize this sounds more naive than even I feel: sue the hell out of the bar and the bouncer. (Don't even get me started about uncontrolled proto-cops!) Sue the cops. Report them for police brutality and stupidity. There are always structural issues--like for instance not enough cops from communities of color, but there also has to be individual accountability and business accountability when cop functions are done by private employees.
A couple weeks ago there were three cops who work in the Seattle burbs busted for beating up a suspect / informant and threatening his life. Surprise two of the cops were white, one may be Hispanic and the informant was black. Apparently there is history between the cops and this guy but the arrests would not have happened at all without a LONG sequence of people getting upset about very questionable police practices.
> i have some choice experiences with the sizzlean and i don't give a shit
> what kind of jeopardy they're in. i _do_ try to understand,
> ...
I have also accumulated both choice and neutral experiences in a variety of circumstances, political events and other matters.
--I spent a certain amount of time trying to help spouse get rid of a stalker, a colorful demented idiot who beat the crap out of spouse several times, tried to break into our house, is suspected in a fire, and probably generally belongs under close mental health supervision for lots more reasons I do not know about. Whether or not calling the cops was the best option, I called the cops, multiple times, partly because I was just hopping mad furious sometimes. Suffice it to say, the whole experience made me trust cops even less than before and respect SOME of the hard situations they find themselves in a little more. And if the @#$#$ who was stalking us would ever apologize, I would also tell him some opinions I have formed.....
--I did manage to escape bodily harm by cop even though I once answered the door FOR ONE OF MY OWN CALLS with a knife in my hand. I had been in the kitchen cooking. For some reason I switched the knife from right to left hand instead of putting it down. The cop had no way of knowing I am right handed or that I probably could not see to aim reasonably; only later did I even realize I had been holding the knife the whole time. But at least I speak fluent English!
> i then informed both of them--both black--that they were racist and
> classist.
>
> he told me not to go there. gee, i wonder why!
>
>
> kelley
>
Just speaking for myself, I am generaly reluctant to tell people how to be Black. In fact, it's not really fair to agitate for more respresentative police forces and then dis the cops of color who result. But sometimes their actions definitely allow one to form opinions. The current president of the local police guild, their union, is Black. People have been agitating about racial profiling and police accountability for several years and so far on some questions the city has been hiding behind the terms of the collective bargaining agreement. So this year there is a big push to address the concerns in the collective bargaining agreement. This agitation has been going on for years. Comically, the police guild president gives statements to the paper whining about how the city is introducing new issues, not bargaining in good faith.
But this is a long way from kitchen tours and explanations about diverse vvegetable peelers which in the San Jose case MIGHT have saved a life!
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