Achieving Civil Rights in the Face of Stop & Frisk Abuses
There are pundits who place the US Civil Rights era between
the years 1955 and 1968. This placement
suggests the struggle for civil rights for African-Americans and other hyphenated
Americans was just a 13-year ordeal. Is
this actually the case? Can national
ancestors such as Mississippi NAACP leader Medgar Evers rest easy, assured that
their bloodshed brought franchise, fair deals and justice?
“Much has changed for the better since Mr. Evers’s brutal
death 50 years ago—but there is also much we can still learn and put in use
from the brave life he lived”, reflects St. Senator Eric Adams (D, WF) 20 SD. “Certainly, if he were alive today, he would
be at the front lines against the abuse of Stop and Frisk…Yes, this City would
do well to consider his courage and continue the fight against inequality and
injustice that still exist today.”
The Senator speaks with authority regarding the flaws of the
NYC Police Department’s procedure officially named Stop, Question and
Frisk. Prior to gaining the NYS Senate
seat, he was a NYPD Captain in central Brooklyn. He distinguished his police
career by co-founding 100 Blacks in Law Enforcement Who Care with several other
peace officers. Since taking his NYS
Senate office in 2006, Adams has kept an eye on NYPD activity. A visit to his State Senate website reveals
his dedicated attention to local police matters. There is a downloadable 23-slide presentation
entitled Stop, Question and Frisk
Procedure in the ‘Report’ section.
This slide show gives the objectives of Stop, Question and Frisk; the
procedure for carrying it out; and the four scenarios when a police officer can
conduct Stop, Question and Frisk. Using
2009 Center for Constitutional Rights’
findings and statistics, the State Senator makes a strong case that the
procedure “has unmerited focus on African-American and Latino youth; the
required reporting is not being followed; and the negative impact it has on
youths of color’s psyche and criminal record.” The slide show purports “Of the
four scenarios when a police officer should execute the practice, the
overwhelming scenario is to fulfill quotas or gather names for the NYPD
database”.
It appears that Stop, Question and Frisk flies in the face
of civil rights. When queried about the realities of
Stop Question and Frisk the State Senator posits, “Protecting New Yorkers and
protecting their civil rights do not have to be competing interests. We must give our law enforcement the tools
they need to keep us safe. The abuse of
Stop and Frisk is not useful in preventing crime. In fact, it sours communities against working
with police and that means crucial information isn’t shared to stop violence
before it can occur. The practice must
be reformed to better meet the necessary standard of reasonable suspicion, to
remove discrimination, and to ensure more criminals and fewer innocents are
targeted for Stop and Frisk.” His study
and assessment of Stop, Question and Frisk is comparable to Medgar Evers’s work
and concerns. Evers was shot in his back the early morning of June 12, 1963.
Currently the front runner in the race for the Brooklyn
Borough President’s Office, Adams stands to win the election in September. Should he win he will not only be New York
City’s first African American in the seat and but be the first police officer
in several decades. How will he make his
mark as the BP serving all of Brooklyn? Adam
says, “This is a pivotal moment for Brooklyn.
We have become very popular in recent years but that hasn’t meant a
better quality of life for everyone. I
want to turn our popularity into prosperity for all. The BP must have a unifying vision for the
borough that brings all Brooklynites together to make Brooklyn the best it can
be.”
Labels: African Americans, black interest, civil rights movement, community, discrimination, NYC, NYC politics, NYS Senate, Stop and Frisk, urban
The Black Power Mix Tape 1967 - 1975
The Brooklyn Academy of Music put substance into celebrating M.L. King, Jr. Day in Brooklyn. Two theaters within BAM Rose Cinema were packed with people absorbing "The Black Power Mix Tape 1967 - 1975." This documentary is a compilation of interviews and B-roll with people key to the Civil Rights and Black Power Movements done by Swedish reporters very attuned to the social movement occurring in and by Americans. It mixes old interviews with Stokely Carmichael (Kwame Ture), Eldridge Cleaver, Martin Luther King, Jr., Angela Davis and others with voiceover commentaries from Talib Kweli, Sonia Sanchez, Abiodun Oyewole, and Erykah Badu, to name a few.
The Swedes' persistence in broadcasting what was happening in the United States brought condemnation on them and created friction between national leaders. Even TV Guide--not associated with Pulitzer Prize winning journalism--criticized the reporters for exposing only the social problems. In the spirit of the New York Times, they were simply broadcasting all the news that was fit to air.
The time period contains the expansion of Martin Luther King's concerns to global and class struggle, King's assassination, the birth of the Black Panthers, the evolution of SNCC, the arrest of Angela Davis, the Vietnam War, the heroin epidemic, and the choices the larger US black population made in carving a place within US society. The feminist and gay rights movements acknowledge using the terminology and tactics of the Black Power and Civil Rights leadership.
It was uplifting to see the jovial and warm side of Kwame Ture. Angela Davis was the epitome of grace under fire as she spoke passionately about the irony of black people being characterized as violent when she remembers her four young friends in Birmingham being killed by a bomb's explosion or the need for her male family members and neighbors to patrol their community armed due to the frequent brutal and lethal attacks by white society.
While it was later revealed in US news reports that many of the servicemen's corpses held bags of heroin as they were wheeled off the planes and onto American runways, it was startling to revisit the Vietnam war to learn many documented as dying in combat where actually deaths from drug overdose.
The connection between the heroin flooding inner city communities and the average black persons resolve to learn more and do more to change his circumstances was strongly made. The clip of radio announcer Vy Higgensen's lamenting the life of a newborn addicted to heroin is one of many poignant moments in the documentary.
Thought and the clouding of it, is one element of the human dynamic. Most of the leaders featured--Huey Newton, Eldridge Cleaver, Angela Davis, Martin Luther King, Jr, and Kathleen Cleaver--had a lit cigarette between their fingers. Did they consider how their smoking habit impacted their health or the cigarette producers' revenues. Seated behind a desk with stacks of books, the manager of Liberation Bookstore contends the road to black people's empowerment is gaining knowledge and applying it. Unfortunately, narcotics, alcohol and chemicalized food are plentiful in the ghetto.
Getting free from mood altering substances and the promise of what a disciplined life yields was and is the charm of the Nation of Islam (NOI). A young dewy-faced Louis Farrakhan reveals in an interview the stance that the white man is the devil if one understands to be a devil is to be wicked; and the white man has been wicked to blacks. The NOI's ability to rehabilitate drug addicted and undereducated people was well-known during this time. There's footage of a long line of young boys dressed in suits, ties and bows orderly getting on buses. This is a relief from seeing unwashed and miskept children in earlier scenes.
Black Power Mix Tape is not a feel good documentary; rather it is a neutral archive of locations, people, statements and occurrences for the viewer to experience. It is for the viewer to digest and assess. It is for the viewer to make use of the stories relayed.
Labels: black power movement, civil rights movement, community control, drug addiction, heroin, NYC politics, Vietnam War
