Waaaaaaay back in 1883, author and abolitionist Frederick Douglass wrote about how crime had become racialized, saying that the U.S. had a tendency to “impute crime to color.” Scholar Angela Davis wrote about how, once chattel slavery ended, “Black Codes” were established specifically targeting the African-American population in such a way that certain actions were “criminalized only when the person charged was Black.” These discriminatory acts may have their genesis in the late 19th century but they are being played out in real time—here and now, in the 21st century.
Earlier this month a Virginia middle school student was handcuffed and arrested for allegedly stealing a 65-cent carton of milk—a drink he was entitled to as a recipient of the school’s free lunch program. And just this week near Sacramento, a graduating high school senior was removed by police from his own graduation ceremony for adding an African-centered accoutrement to his graduation cap and gown.
Yes, these things actually did happen.
CBS affiliate WTVR in Virginia reports that:
The situation began May 10 at Graham Park Middle School in Triangle when Ryan [Turk], according to his mother, went back to the lunch line to get his milk.
It was then, WJLA reported, a Prince William County Police Officer accused Ryan of stealing the milk.
Ryan then became disorderly, police said, and needed to be placed in handcuffs.
The teenager said he indeed pulled back from the officer.
"I yanked away from him I told him to get off of me because he's not my Dad," the middle school student said.
The school says that Ryan was “suspended for theft, being disrespectful and using his cell phone in school.” A spokesperson said, "The need for disciplinary action is determined by how a student behaves throughout any given incident." Ryan was also searched for drugs, the school said, because he was acting “fidgety.”
In Elk Grove, California, Nyree Holmes did what many African-American high school and college graduates do: He wore a “stole”—a narrow piece of fabric that drapes behind the neck and over the shoulders—over his graduation gown. The stole, in the design of Kente cloth which comes from the West African nation of Ghana, was representative of Holmes’ heritage and, again, numerous African-American graduates (as well as some faculty members) across the country also wear them during graduation ceremonies. But unlike those graduates, Holmes was told by a school administrator to remove the fabric and when he didn’t, he says police met him as he finished crossing the graduation stage.
Xanthi Pinkerton, director of communications at the Elk Grove Unified School District, confirmed that a student had been escorted from the premises by Elk Grove School District police officers during the graduation ceremony. Cosumnes Oaks High School did not respond to a direct request for comment.
“By the request of a school administrator a student was pulled from the graduation ceremony because the student wasn’t obeying the rules of graduation,” said Pinkerton. “But they were just escorted out.”
Police and sheriff’s deputies are not merely “escorts.” They are representatives of law enforcement who have the power of detention and life and death over a civilian population. While crime has been imputed to color since at least since the 19th century, in the 21st century it has become both expedient and popular to utilize law enforcement as a form of social control (particularly for people of color), but also increasingly for dissent and other actions deemed “out of order.” These examples of state sanctioned terrorism—what else do you call handcuffing 6-year-old children and cheering parents at a high school graduation?—shall occur with more frequency and regularity as time goes on. The only silver lining is that sooner or later, hopefully, people of color won’t be the only ones feeling the pain of such actions.