By Steve Beynon For The Miami Student
Due to the recent events in Ferguson, you may have noticed a swell in racist comments and white privilege ignorance showing up on your social media. And maybe you've seen it even more, because Miami University doesn't exactly have the greatest reputation for ethnic and economic diversity.
Denying racism is the new racism; modern racism is more subtle. Some people believe racism is strictly Jim Crow and using the 'N Word'. The Daily Show's Jon Stewart had a good point on this, "If you're tired of hearing about this, imagine how exhausting it is for them."
Police in the United States kill more civilians than all other developed countries combined. In 2012, 409 Americans were shot by police. Most of those were black men. That same year, 412 soldiers were killed in Afghanistan. This is shocking considering violent crime in America is at a 40 year low, according to the FBI.
Last year, 33 police officers were killed by gunfire. This is the lowest number since 1887 according to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund. Yes, we are facing a 127 year low in criminals killing police officers with guns. However, over 450 civilians were killed by police in 2013, according to the Washington Post.
It's difficult for the press to get an accurate count for all of the police killings. The government doesn't track how many people are killed by cops, but the FBI does track "justifiable" police killings, which is reported to be about 400 per year. Many media outlets claim that number is inaccurate, and some argue that number is over 1,000 overall. Regardless, it's disturbing there's not any accurate reporting for lawful use of force.
There isn't any reliable data for how many police shootings are against citizens that are unarmed. But, a study conducted by the NAACP discovered out of 45 officer-involved shootings in the city between 2004 and 2008, 37 of those shot were black. One-third of the shootings resulted in fatalities and 40 percent of people shot were unarmed.
These kinds of statistics beg the question: How reliable is a cop's testimony? Last month, controversy arose after Cleveland Police shot and killed 12-year-old Tamir Rice, an unarmed black child.
Two Cleveland Police Officers responded to a 911 call saying, "There's a guy walking around with a Pistol. It's probably fake, but he's pointing it at everyone." The caller was calm and even stayed in the same area as Rice until officers showed up. Officials say the dispatcher didn't relay that the gun may have been fake.
The responding officers orginally reported they arrived to a few people and they saw Rice, "pick up a gun from the table and put it in his waistband." The officers said they ordered the boy to put up his hands three times. After the shooting, the officers reported Rice was, "maybe 20 [years old]."
If you take that story at face value, it sounds potentially threatening. You have a 20-year-old man with a group of people that picks up a gun, and approaches two officers and ignores orders to raise his hands up. Disturbingly though, a surveillance video shows not one word of that story to be true.
The truth is Rice was playing with a realistic looking toy gun at a park and police officers drove their vehicle onto the grass, stopping directly in front of the child. They got out and immediately gunned Rice down, without giving the boy a chance to surrender. The entire encounter happened in approximately two seconds.
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At least one round hit Rice's stomach. Neither officer administered first aid and video shows they watched the boy as he bled out until a detective and an FBI agent who happened to be in the area arrived and treated the boy's wounds three minutes and forty nine seconds after he was shot.
This shooting led to several protests across the country - including a hacker, who goes by Anonymous, shutting down the Cleveland city website. Several city and state officials have condemned the actions of the police. Dan Williams, a spokesman for Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson, said both of the officers' actions are under investigation.
This isn't an isolated incident. Just Google "Unarmed Black Man Shot By Police." and you'll see an endless list of news stories. In September, when a South Carolina State Trooper shot a black man for slowly reaching for his driver's license after the cop ordered him to. This past November, a Cop shot a black man in Jacksonville, Florida while he was holding one hand up and using his other arm to carry his six year old daughter having an asthma attack. The cop thought he had a gun at his side. I thought Florida was all about the 2nd Amendment?
If we can't agree there's a race issue, meet me in the middle and agree that too many American police are trigger happy.
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