Why action to end Systemic Racism can't wait

Subject: RE: Why action to end Systemic Racism can't wait
From: Greg F.
Date: 03 Aug 15 - 09:18 AM

August 3, 2015
POCOMOKE CITY, Md. — Kelvin Sewell figured he had landed his dream job in 2010, when he retired as a Baltimore police officer to help run the tiny 16-member force in this little riverfront city, which calls itself "the friendliest town on the Eastern Shore." A year later he became its first African-American police chief.

Blacks and whites have coexisted, sometimes uneasily, in Pocomoke for centuries, but Chief Sewell, with his easygoing manner, quickly fit in. He prodded officers to patrol on foot, pleasing business owners. He helped poor students fill out college applications. Crime, everyone agrees, went down on his watch.

But the chief's abrupt dismissal in June, without explanation, by a white mayor and majority white City Council that voted along racial lines, has torn Pocomoke asunder, wrecking old friendships and exposing a deep racial rift in this community of roughly 4,100 people, split almost evenly between black and white.

Resistance to slavery was strong in Maryland, but the lower Eastern Shore, just across the border from Virginia, was home to Confederate sympathizers during the Civil War. The early 20th century brought lynch mobs. The region was slow to desegregate its schools and even slower to elect blacks to government, said Deborah Jeon, legal director for the A.C.L.U. of Maryland, which in the 1990s brought a voting rights case that forced changes in the way Pocomoke's surrounding county, Worcester, held elections.

"It's not like the rest of Maryland; it's more like the Deep South," Ms. Jeon said. "They fought us tooth and nail to prevent changes in the election system, even though the county had an all-white government for 250 years."

Whole Article Here

Subject: any mod help request
From: wysiwyg
Date: 03 Aug 15 - 09:59 AM

I am gratified by the civility of discourse thus far! But as OP, I would request that since discussion has veered so far away from the original tragedy it would be best to close this one. (Someone could start another.)

A primer on the different forms of racism-- "systemic" having for instance a particular meaning in Anti-Racism work-- seems to be needed for several who have been opining in recent weeks. I'll look forward to starting THAT discussion when the return from NoWiFiLand permits.

~Susan

Subject: RE: Why action to end Systemic Racism can't wait
From: GUEST, ^*^
Date: 03 Aug 15 - 11:34 AM

This may bring it back around a bit for you, ~Susan.

I don't do this for just anyone, but I heard a radio interview with a local author last week, whose next project is a book for young adults about Hillary Clinton. The Clintons have been "out there" working on these things. I transcribed a few minutes of the interview, to give a view of Hillary's background for insight into the issues that will be important to her:

KarenB: There's a fascinating person in our history right, the leading Democratic contender right now, a woman who has done an unbelievable number of things. Many of them quite fascinating, from being the first commencement speaker at Wellesley and getting her picture in Life Magazine for the sharp words she used to Senator Ed Brook, to serving as Secretary of State, and a lot of things in between. So it's turned out to be a very big and complex project, cause she's a pretty complex person.

KrysB: What did you learn about Hillary Clinton the child? What kind of kid was she?

KarenB: She was a lot of what you'd expect an oldest girl to be. She was very driven from an early age, she was a good student, she was interested in politics from a very young age. Her father was a stout Republican and so she was a republican too. She campaigned for Barry Goldwater. She had a hat or shirt that said "Au H2O" the chemical symbols for "gold water," she had a little Goldwater cowboy get up, she was very concerned, like her father, about Republican issues, as a young kid, and she doesn't actually shift politics until she's in college at Wellesley in the heart of the Anti-war movement and in the Civil Rights movement. Some of the things I learned about her that were quite fascinating (40:20) that we don't know so much is that she's a person of very deep faith, she grew up in the Methodist church, she was very involved in her youth group, and there they had a youth group leader not just to issues of faith but to art and culture and poetry, so even 20 years later she's quoting e.e. cummings at something they talked about in these youth group meetings.

She had a strong social bend and as a kid babysat for children of migrant workers who came to her suburb of Chicago when it was still agricultural, before they even built the OHare airport. There are a lot of pieces of her that still show up, including that little Republican streak you see sometimes where she is probably more centerist than people think she is.

Krys: Why was it decided that Bill Clinton would be the first in that relationship to run for office?

Karen: Bill started out wanting to run for office. When they met at Yale, the Law School in the early 1970s, one of the first things he told her was "I've got to go back to Arkansas and run for office, cause that's what I want to do, that's who I am." Her attitude was "I'm not sure exactly what direction I want to go, but you have a pretty clear direction" and for a while they weren't sure it was going to work. She went to work for the Children's Defense Fund, then she gets an opportunity to work on the judiciary committee investigating Richard Nixon. So one of the things I was totally struck by, was this woman has had a front row seat in every significant moment in American history in the last 50 years. As a young person this youth group leader took her and her group to hear Martin Luther King speak in Chicago, she's there at Yale when there's a huge anti-war rallies, and the trial of the Black Panthers, she's on the Nixon Judiciary Committee team, she is involved with all of the things that happened in the 90s from the First Lady's role, but going back to your question, Bill knew from the beginning that he wanted to run for office, and that wasn't waht she thought she wanted to do. She just knew she wanted to do something good in the world.

Krys: What do you expect her primary issues to be:

Karen: This email thing is so consistent for her. She is distrustful of the media, she always has been, she has never really been able to work out a relationship with the media that makes the media feel good about it. They're not quickly receptive, they don't correct issues, certain details that people would just like to clarify or are hard to get corrected by her team and so do things to the letter of the law that to the rest of us might seem impractical.

She's never been as strong a campaigner as Bill. Bill was probably one of the best campaigners of our times. He had a natural ability to speak, he had a natural ability to win confidence in a group. Mario Cuomo one said "you campaign in poetry, you govern in prose" and I think in a lot of ways she's better at the prose than she is at the poetry.

You're stumbling on parts of a complex person, Ake, but when it comes down to it, the Clintons are still in the right place at the right time.

Subject: RE: Why action to end Systemic Racism can't wait
From: Joe Offer
Date: 07 Aug 15 - 12:28 AM

There's no question in my mind that racism in police departments is a very important issue, but it is only one of many causes of police misconduct. In Internet discussions, I find that people are often too quick to blame others for problems, and too slow to offer solutions to those problems.

Even police officers who have some racist elements in their thinking and background, are not necessarily unredeemably horrible people. Indeed, many of them follow the rules and do what they're supposed to do, even though they may not particularly like people of other races. Once they've had favorable contacts with people of other races, their racism often melts away quickly.

I'm on the board of a community organizing group called Placer People of Faith Together, a member of the PICO National Network. Over the last five years, we have worked closely with the Hispanic community in our county. Most of our county is rural or small towns, but we do have one city, Roseville, a suburb of Sacramento with a population of 128,000. Roseville has the full spectrum of urban problems, including a police department with some history of racism. A couple of years ago, Roseville hired its first nonwhite police chief, a black man who had been a shining star in the Sacramento Police Department. The guy is a pro, and he looks like a movie star. On top of that, he's just a really nice person. But the Hispanics have had a tough time in Roseville, and they weren't sure whether they could trust this new police chief, even though he comes from a racial minority.

Recently, California passed a law allowing undocumented immigrants to get California drivers' licenses. We and the Roseville Police Department wanted to get licenses for as many people as possible, so we wanted to offer training so people could pass the exam. The logical place to offer training was the police department, but we were afraid that people wouldn't trust the police enough to go to their headquarters for classes. So, we decided to have a series of open houses at the police department, with bilingual tour guides, refreshments, and a party atmosphere. People loved the tours, and then they flocked to the police department for the classes. And police-community relations improved quickly. On top of that, lots of Hispanic immigrants are very proud bearers of California Drivers' Licenses.

If we want to improve things, we have to do it with imagination and an open heart. I suppose there's a place for confrontation and litigation - but I think it's essential that we try positive approaches first, and use confrontation and litigation as a last resort.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: Why action to end Systemic Racism can't wait
From: Jack Campin
Date: 07 Aug 15 - 07:23 AM

A domestic Abu Ghraib for Chicago blacks:

http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/feb/24/chicago-police-detain-americans-black-site

A lot of good training white cops in racial sensitivity will do to get that thing demolished.

Subject: RE: Why action to end Systemic Racism can't wait
From: Greg F.
Date: 07 Aug 15 - 10:20 AM

I think it's essential that we try positive approaches first, and use confrontation and litigation as a last resort.

Any reason we can't use 'em simultaneously, Joe?

Subject: RE: Why action to end Systemic Racism can't wait
From: GUEST,Stim
Date: 07 Aug 15 - 12:12 PM

On this question:

I think it's essential that we try positive approaches first, and use confrontation and litigation as a last resort.

Any reason we can't use 'em simultaneously, Joe?


Once litigation has begun, the opposing parties can't talk about the issues without the attorneys present.

Subject: RE: Why action to end Systemic Racism can't wait
From: Greg F.
Date: 07 Aug 15 - 01:46 PM

Obviously, Stim. I didn't mean simultaneously on the SAME CASE.