Setting aside the circumstances of the alleged criminal activity in the recent death of black teenager Paul O’Neal by the hands (gun) of the Chicago police department, what do I say to my sons?
The O’Neal conversation is easy to broach. You can make excuses for a far too often shoot first ask, [no] questions later policy with the explanation of, stealing gets you in trouble. The fact that over one-hundred young black men and women died this past year at the end of law enforcer’s gun barrel frightens me. We like to white wash these incidents by pointing to the problems of violent neighborhoods, or drugs and street gangs to appease our violence numbed minds. Tell me how I explain Philando Castile or Jordan Davis?
Mr. Castile worked hard, hand a penchant for accumulating parking tickets and otherwise kept his nose clean. He even followed the preaching of the NRA and legally armed himself. By all accounts he was a beloved worker of the school system that employed him and was raising a child and been in no serious legal trouble. Mr. Castile was gunned down in his car in front of his fiancé and child because he failed to move his hands in just the right manner, when asked for his license and registration.
Jordan Davis, was a passenger in a car full of boisterous teenagers and played loud music. His crime was annoying an adult. He was shot and killed. This has been a malady of youth since the time of Aristotle who wrote, “The young people of today think of nothing but themselves. They have no reverence for parents or old age.” Aristotle died in 332 BC.
So we have three instances: a teen stealing a car and taking a joy ride which has been depicted in every teenage coming of age movie since the 1938 movie ‘Angels with Dirty Faces.’ Philando Castile who followed the law to its deadly letter: and Jordan Davis whose crime was being a petulant teenage boy. My only alternative is to say to my Black sons in 2016, “white people are afraid of you.” It is nothing you did or nothing you said it is a fear born of prejudice, ignorance and the willful flouting of fact. The prejudice comes from seeing the empty hands of a Black man who is not holding a ball or a microphone and believing that he is inherently dangerous. Ignorance, is a manifestation of what the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. called being “integrated out of power.” You can be around us just don’t ever look to lead. For years prior to cell phone cameras and video recording equipment small enough to fit into your pocket, people of color were told it was our imaginations that made us feel we were targets of authority. The willful ignorance to the reports of brutality were safe havens from the recognition or admission.
I am asking a serious question of all who read this; what do I say to my sons in the wake of law abiding teens and adults who were unjustifiably shot dead? None of their perceived offenses were or are punishable by death. Were they dangerous or threatening because they acted and reacted the same way white teens and men conduct their lives all over America every day? I am asking, what do I say as a Black father to keep them alive?
Vote 2016
