Long time activist, Tom Hayden thinks that Rev. Al Sharpton’s call for a National Day of Demonstrations on December 13th is the right call.
By RA Monaco
Predictably, protests have continued nightly on the momentum of Eric Garner last words, “I can’t breathe.” In New York, protesters holding signs with those words continue to chant, “Shame, shame, shame” for the eighth consecutive night.
A group of young black activist have organized what they are calling a “Millions March” in New York City as part of a national day of action on Saturday.
Long time activist Tom Hayden, commenting during Margaret Prescod’s radio program Sojourner Truth said, “Imagine where we would be without those cameras?” Hayden mentioned that he thinks that Rev. Al Sharpton’s call for the December 13th National Day of Demonstrations is the right call. “It’s the only way to unify what is happening, which is case after case of local violations of constitutional rights and abuses of power by police,” said Hayden.
As an activist, Hayden knows a thing or two about movements. He was arrested for protesting at the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago, becoming one of the “Chicago Seven” defendants who were convicted for conspiracy to incite violence but later had their convictions overturned. Also a co-founder of Students for a Democratic Society in 1961, Hayden was jailed in Albany, Georgia, for attempting to desegregate a rail station.
On the heels of grand jury decisions not to indict NYPD Officer Daniel Pantaleo for the death of Eric Garner or Ferguson Officer Darren Wilson for the death of Michael Brown, rage continues to swell in anticipation of another probable grand jury disappointment in the tragic shooting death of 12-year-old Tamir Rice by Cleveland Police Officer Timothy Loehmann.
What would the future landscape of policing look like?
“I think that we really need to focus not so much on simple reforms of what the police are doing already” explained Brooklyn College Prof. Alex S. Vitale. “We need to ask some fundamental questions about the proper role of the police” explained Vitale.
The consensus at the moment seems to be that the time for platitudes and promises is past—that something needs to give. “In the aggregate we know that these kinds of occurrences just don’t happen in white communities,” said Prof. Vitale, “The police have a different attitude about what types of tactics [and] behaviors are acceptable in communities of color.”
The protestor’s need to “unify” in these moments said Tom Hayden. Productively harnessing their justifiable rage with a vividly shared vision of what the future landscape of policing might look like—a defined and shared framing of the future role of policing—is the logical first step. Professor Vitale suggests, “One way to start is the question of drugs and whether or not the police should have any role in that at all?”
Bratton’s philosophy “Broken-Windows” policing
“I think the issue comes down in New York and therefore nationally,” Hayden told Prescod, “is the unnecessary and stupid killing of Eric Garner, is a result of William Bratton’s philosophy of policing.” While on air, Hayden went on to say that “I don’t want to be too hard on Bratton—but I warned about this.”
Specifically, Hayden was referring to “Broken-Windows” policing. Essentially it’s a policing style Hayden explained, that says “that somebody like Garner who may or may not have been selling cigarettes illegally on the street has to be stopped because he is a potential felon—a potential maniac—and if you don’t stop these petty infractions from happening and improve what they call the quality of life, which is the quality of life for white liberal people in cities—I guess—it will go on.”
An issue of oppression
The president’s task force needs to question these practices in the upcoming hearings Hayden told listeners during the closing moments of the program Sojourner Truth.
Writing for The Nation, Mychal Denzel Smith keenly observed, “We keep applying the language and framework of accountability, diversity and sensitivity to an issue of oppression.” The words are beginning to resonate—slowly.
Platitudes may no longer be enough to diffuse the public’s festering discontent. Calls for peaceful protest to many seem like code for maintaining the status quo when change is needed and long overdue.
Postscript
The Friday December 5th, 2014 interview of Jackie Goldberg and Tom Hayden can be heard in its entirety on Margaret Prescod’s WPFK Public Radio program Sojourner Truth: http://archive.kpfk.org/...
WPFK Los Angeles 90.7 FM Archives: http://archive.kpfk.org/
http://www.kpfk.org/...
The entire interview of Professors Alex S. Vitale and Robin D.G. Kelley can be heard on Suzi Weissman’s Friday December 5th, 2014 5:00 pm WPFK Public Radio program Beneath the Surface radio program: http://archive.kpfk.org/...
WPFK Los Angeles 90.7 FM Archives: http://archive.kpfk.org/
Suzi Weissman is an Associate Professor of Politics at Saint Mary’s College of California and sits on the editorial boards of “Critique” and “Against the Current.”
http://kpfk.org/...