I have been trying so hard not to weigh in on the latest example of draconian police response to perceived threat from the scarey black people, but I am SICK to my stomach, and have been ever since the McKinney incident was first reported. I cannot stay silent on this, I need to write so that, perhaps, I can sleep tonight.
I know that what happened isn't bothering some folks much, and that others don't think it's THAT big a deal: there are some commenters here who are taking this lightly, and making jokes - there's a cartoon that could be funny, for example, but I'm in no mood to laugh about it.
And then here comes another stupidity report from Fox News. Originally posted on Crooks and Liars "Fox News finds black mom to blame pool melee on black kids". Excerpt below:
Day after day it is astounding to see how the producers at Fox and Friends find ways to appeal to their bigoted, and sexist viewers. Saturday Night Live's sketch that accurately portrays the trio of trivia must be revamped this next season, as their selection of news-worthy stories is really scraping the bottom of the barrel. Today, Steve Doocy calls attention to Kisa Jackson, a black mother from Dallas, who made a video rant about the conduct of the black kids in the now infamous McKinney Texas pool party video.
Kisa doesn't see the controversy in blaming the black kids because, as she says in the video,
"The white kids weren't running, the black kids were."
More, below the orange squiggle (it's a long rant, so buckle up).
Problem is, Ms. Kisa, while acknowledging that the kids had reason to be afraid (maybe they were running because the probability of getting cop-murdered while being black is pretty high), she still insisted the black kids were in the wrong. Turns out she was throwing stones when her own house was glass ... as reported on Raw Story's website:
But neither Doocy nor Jackson mentioned that police in Baton Rouge, Louisiana had to go to great lengths to catch up with her son, Jalen Mills, before finally arresting him last June for allegedly punching a woman in the mouth.
and
Mills’ initial avoidance seems to run counter to Jackson’s statement in her video that parents “should teach your children that when the police arrive to a scene, you stand there and you wait for instructions.” He was initially charged with second-degree battery and suspended from the team. The woman accused him of hitting her a month earlier outside his apartment.
In the McKinney incident, I recall that the boys started running when Casebolt pointed a weapon at them after they tried to comfort the girl he was sitting on. One of them stumbled. Casebolt was cocked and ready to go even though the young man backed away with his hands up, immediately. Knowing that cops like to shoot to kill at African Americans, what reasonable person could blame them for that? She could, Fox news could, and so could every sappy-happy racist jerk in the US, apparently. As for Ms. Jackson, she forgot that one must practice what one preaches.
I could never, ever take this lightly. Or make jokes about it, or excuse the officer who slung that child around, and brutalized her the way he did. I know that people deal with things in all sorts of ways - I have a relative that giggles and laughs at others' misfortunes, hurts, and pain. Personally, I think that's monstrous, but that's how she reacts. I get that. But I can't help my reaction to what I perceive as insensitivity either.
I am sick for the frightened children who were manhandled and terrorized by cop because a few racists were assumed to be telling the truth when they called the cops and claimed a bunch of African American children were trespassing and climbing the fence, and innocently failed to mention that they, the racists, had attacked those children verbally and physically, for having the NERVE to be at a community pool that they had a right to use as residents and guests of residents in the neighborhood.
I was incensed to hear and see that Sean Toon is being touted as the poster boy for American Values by Fox News, and that his sins - past, recent past, and current - are being ignored. I am furious that his role in this outrage is being covered up in the rush to whip up a frenzy of righteous condemnation and demonizing the 'evil scarey black monsters' in the mist neighborhood.
I'm thankful and relieved that the other 11 or so cops on the scene stayed calm and professional in the face of Casebolt's gross over-reaction and that two of them had the presence of mind to try to calm him when he drew his gun, threatened the two boys trying to help the girl he was sitting on and looked like he was going to shoot someone for 'resisting'.
I was sick to my stomach again hearing the Becton child crying for her mama while Casebolt slung her around, and afraid for the boys who tried to help her while she was being kneed and sat on.
I'm thankful it wasn't worse, because the bastard had tried to slam that poor child into the concrete first, before slamming her into the turf.
And Ms. Kisa Jackson, SHAME ON YOU! For so many things: talking out of turn, taking an holier-than-thou stance when you didn't know - or apparently care - about the facts, and for conveniently forgetting about practicing what you preach, as well as showing integrity, honesty, kindness, or compassion.
I'm also upset because I am reliving one of the most traumatic incidents in my life. I hurt for those kids because I know what they felt like, being accused, confused, not knowing or understanding what was wrong, assaulted by a cop, and in danger of getting shot, or assumed to be in the wrong and to have done something illegal because some lunatic name-calling fool called in a complaint and was presumed to be telling the truth without question.
Somewhere in the commentary for one of the articles I saw where one someone posted a a flippant remark that I interpreted as, oh well, they got introduced to life; welcome to the real world. That really burns me. These were somebody's children, and in effect their childhood was ended by some racist bullies masquerading as responsible adults and capped off by an out-of-control cop - they got welcomed to the real world, alright. And their only sin seems to have been that they were black and presumed guilty of everything until the details started to come out.
I have more than a little suspicion that maybe that big coward of a cop was living out some 'cop-on-steroids' fantasy, to be able to picture a 14-year-old girl in a bikini, walking away, as such an imminent threat that had to be slammed, hollered at, cursed, and kneed in the back, and it had to be nasty, for him to see her as so much of a threat that he had to physically subdue her by straddling her like he was about to rape her. I don't know what in hell he thought he was doing, or why he was doing it, but he'll be the monster in that girl's dreams for years to come. I don't hold out much hope he'll think much about the consequences of what he did, but if he has daughters, he should.
Then again, you know, I'm sure he was thinking she HAD to be one of the alleged fence climbing, 'section 8', 'black f****rs' they got called to roust (according to Sean Toon and his wife's two friends - the actual aggressors and evildoers).
Yeah. Right. Sure. The child's hysterical crying for her mama and asking her friends to help her and go for her mama could have been a ruse instead of the jarring cry for help of someone whose world just flipped on its axis ... wonder how he'd have felt had it been his daughter being treated that way by some macho Jerk cop like him?
When the details started to come out, we learned that the person who made the call to the cops and told them the kids were fence-climbing (implying gate-crashing in the 'wrong neighborhood') was Sean Toon's wife, who then took her kids home while her husband and friends attacked the ... 'section-8 interlopers'.
So what message did the McKinney police and the Toons and their two friends send to the Caucasian and African American children who were socializing together peacefully, if noisily? The same one that the white-splaining teacher from the Frenship school district defiantly articulated in plain and extremely clear language in her Facebook rant and kind-of apologized for with a non-apology, here.
It was the vicious, nastier, meaner version of the message that all African American parents give their children out of love and concern for them, and that no one of them ever believes is significant until reality is forced on them: that they live in a world where brown and chocolate-hued children who live in what used to be segregated neighborhoods should NEVER try to socialize, party or play in public without being aware of what, and who is near by, especially if they're in uniform.
Those children learned that some people, the 'white folks' - that's my parents' code word for racists - and many law enforcement officers - believe they are dangerous, barely human, and that they 'are the ones causing the problems and this "racial tension",' as the former Frenship elementary school teacher put it. The 'white folks' imply that African Americans should be isolated and resegregated as being unfit, uneducated, barely human animals who must be kept away from the 'innocent white people' at all costs.
And the last message they heard: "better lay low, better keep your eyes down, better take the abuse, don't talk back, don't move too fast, don't turn your back, don't run, and don't try to defend yourself against the liars, the bullies, and brutes, and don't stand up for yourself, because you have no rights, no privileges, and are guilty even when shown to be innocent. The 'white folks' who attack you, lie about you, and try to hurt you are always assumed to be right, will get the benefit of the doubt, and will be believed, excused or explained into innocence or not culpable, while you get told you must have done something to deserve whatever they put you through."
They heard "If you do not submit and take it, you may be attacked, brutalized, beaten, violated, or killed"; in other words, you could be falsely accused of trespassing and get a gun stuck in your face by a rabid cop for ... no reason at all, other than being one of 'THEM', one of 'those people'. And we have heard it reiterated on Fox News, ad nauseam.
The African American children were shown how close they could come to being hurt or killed because racists can attack them, lie to the cops and know that their story WILL NOT BE questioned by at least one cop before things start to go bad. This time, God was good: while the children were badly traumatized, no one was shot, probably because there were too many witnesses and too many cops who were not having an hysterical meltdown, as well as there being two officers present who were calm and professional enough to talk their supervisor down.
And if I sound touchy about this, I am. Extremely so. I have nieces and nephews that age, and we are all afraid every time they go out with their friends because there is so much crap like this going on. While I know their Caucasian friends will be safe, and will protect them if they can, I am still terrified that one will be hurt ...
They know no fear, not yet. Neither did I at that age, but I learned it, soon enough, and sadly, although I had forgotten over the many, many years since my first lesson in how dangerous racists can be, it was a lesson that I was forcibly reminded of again, unfortunately, when I moved to Texas in 2012.
My first lesson in the nature of racism, discrimination, and 'white folks' lies, came at the age of 14, also, and what I hate - absolutely HATE - is that the right of passage for the minority community, but especially for African American children, has become 'trial by bigot and possible-death-by-cop'.