Estimated Reading Time: 8 minutes 46 seconds
As the not-so-civil war turns from cold to hot and the world around us burns, I find myself in the unenviable position of despising both sides in the battle.
BLUE LIVES DON’T MATTER
On one side is law enforcement, a community which I deem to be at best egregiously incompetent and at worst brutally malevolent and maliciously fascistic.
I have only ever had negative experiences with law enforcement. Every on-duty cop I’ve ever interacted with has been either lazy, entitled or a brutish and violent tyrant…and sometimes all three at once.
It is obvious to me that police in America are a government sanctioned gang, the largest organized crime apparatus in the nation.
One of the first things I ever wrote on this blog was about Ethan Saylor, a 26 year-old man with Down’s Syndrome who had three off-duty Maryland cops working as mall security kneel on his back in 2011 while trying to subdue him for breaking the rule of not promptly leaving a movie theatre after his screening of Zero Dark Thirty had ended.
Just like George Floyd seven years later, Ethan Saylor called out to his mom right before he died under the knee of those cops. While Floyd’s killer has been charged with murder, the cops who killed Ethan Saylor were never charged with any crime.
The killing of George Floyd also reminded me of the death of Kelly Thomas in Fullerton, California on 2011.
Thomas was a homeless, mentally-ill 36 year-old man who was beaten to death by six Fullerton, Ca. cops as, just like George Floyd would nine years later, he said he “couldn’t breath” while also crying out to his father, “dad, help me!”.
Thomas’s beating has been described as “one of the worst police beatings in US history”. He had brain injuries as well as rib and facial fractures so severe he choked on his own blood. Thomas’s breathing became permanently constricted because the six officers knelt on his chest as they beat him about his face and head.
All of the officers charged with beating and killing Kelly Thomas were acquitted.
While there are similarities in the Floyd and Saylor and Thomas cases, there are also differences. The biggest difference being that Floyd was black and Saylor and Thomas were white.
This difference in race translated into the media never really caring much when Ethan Saylor and Kelly Thomas were killed, and also no mobs rioting or looting in their honor either. Maybe this is why if you ask a hundred random people you run into on the street who Ethan Saylor or Kelly Thomas were, you’d get back 100 blank stares.
Which brings me to the other side of the shitshow…
BLACK LIVES DON’T MATTER
On the other side is Black Lives Matter and their ilk, who I find to be at best useful idiots to the establishment and at worst insidiously deceptive and intentionally divisive tools of COINTELPRO used to provoke a race war and squelch a class war.
As the events of recent months have unfolded, I have come to believe that America is currently in the grip of a manufactured racial moral panic that is meant to trigger emotion, distort perception and destroy critical thinking capacity. This racial moral panic is a vicious cancer spreading across every sector of this country…and it is terminal.
An example of this racial moral panic is found in both the media and the public’s reaction to the police shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wisconsin.
When I watched the video of Officer Derek Chauvin kneeling on George Floyd’s neck in Minneapolis, I thought, “what the fuck is that cop doing?”
When I watched the video of the police incident in Kenosha with Jacob Blake I thought to myself, “what the fuck is Jacob Blake doing?”
When the cops arrived on the scene at the Blake incident, Blake scuffled with them - leading to cops twice attempting to tase him. Blake then defiantly walked away from officers, all of whom had their guns drawn, and tried to enter and/or reach into his vehicle with one of the cops literally pulling on his shirt to stop him. The cop pulling Blake’s shirt then shot him seven times in the back as he reached into his minivan.
The obvious point in watching the incident is that if Blake had complied with the cops demands than he wouldn’t have been shot. The counter argument heard over and over again from BLM people is that “not complying doesn’t mean you deserve to be shot!”. I wholeheartedly agree…but to quote Clint Eastwood in the film Unforgiven, “deserves got nothin to do with it.”
No one deserves to be shot and no one deserves to be killed. But…if you fight with cops, resist arrest, defy their commands and most importantly ignore their drawn guns and then reach into your vehicle thinking you are immune from consequences…you don’t deserve to be shot but you can sure as hell EXPECT to be shot, regardless of your race or ethnicity.
This recognition of reality is often refuted by BLM types with ridiculous comments about how cops should shoot people in the legs in these situations or some other Hollywood nonsense. Look, if a cop (or soldier) draws a gun they will aim for the chest or head in order to stop the target…which translates into shooting to kill. That is how people, law enforcement included, are trained to use guns, and to believe otherwise is willful ignorance.
This dovetails into another emotional trigger for BLM supporters and that is that Blake was shot seven times. I have heard over and over that this was excessive. If you watch the video of Blake being shot you notice something rather remarkable…during the shooting he continues to struggle. The cop kept shooting him because Blake didn’t immediately fall to the ground. Blake was shot seven times because the cop was shooting to drop him and he didn’t drop…that is what cops and soldiers are trained to do.
The other thing that BLM supporters like to do is emphasize that Blake was “shot in the back” in order to imply something nefarious. This is technically accurate, Blake was shot in the back…but he was also actively resisting a cop trying to stop him from reaching into or getting into a vehicle. There could be, and according to reports there was, a weapon (a knife) in the car, and of course the cop has no idea if Blake is reaching for a gun or not. Blake having his back turned is EXACTLY why he was a threat as the cop couldn’t see for what he was reaching.
Another important point is that even the car itself is considered a deadly weapon in this situation because if Blake got in that car he is then in control of a large movable weapon he can use to harm others, and there are three young children in the car…meaning shooting at Blake once he is inside the vehicle puts those children’s lives at much greater risk. Not to mention that at that time none of the cops knew if Blake was trying to enter the vehicle in order to hurt those children.
BLM supporters highlighting Blake being shot in the back without giving proper context are being extremely deceptive and disingenuous. This same tactic was used when Rayshard Brooks was shot in the back while fleeing cops in Atlanta in the wake of the Floyd killing in Minneapolis. The important piece of information in the Brooks case though is that as he ran he turned and fired a taser at the cop chasing him and was shot less than a second later. This taser was taken off of the officer by Brooks when they fought right before Brooks’ escape attempt. What the BLM crowd ignore is the fact that a taser is a deadly weapon when used against a cop because if a cop is rendered unconscious or immobile, then his gun is unsecure and that constitutes a grave danger to the officer and/or general public.
The Rayshard Brooks case was another one where BLMers were saying “the cops should’ve given him a ride home” instead of trying to arrest him because Brooks was literally so drunk he passed out at a drive thru. No doubt these same hypocritical fools would’ve been on the Mothers Against Drunk Driving bandwagon back in the day when drunk driving was turned from a mere nuisance into a public menace. Of course, cops aren’t going to give a drunk driver a ride home because then they would become liable for his behavior from that point forward. If Brooks hurts himself or someone else after cops drove him home then the police department would be sued beyond recognition…and rightfully so.
NBA DON’T MATTER
In the wake of the Jacob Blake shooting, L.A. Clippers coach Doc Rivers made an emotionally charged statement where he talked about how he, as a black man, has to give a “special talk” to his black children about how to interact with police. This is a common refrain heard from black people in regards to teaching their children how to interact properly with cops in order to avoid being shot. In watching both the Jacob Blake and Rayshard Brooks videos I thought to myself, well…either no one gave these guys “the talk”, or they weren’t paying attention when it was given.
And another point is, who doesn’t talk to their kids about how to safely interact with law enforcement? This is not just some special burden placed on black parents, it is a reality for all parents…all decent parents anyway.
Sadly, Doc Rivers speech was just another example of the racial moral panic in action. In his speech the weeping Rivers spoke of how black people are the ones “being hung” and “being shot” and that black people love this country but this country doesn’t love them.
What was remarkable to me about Rivers’ rant was that the media adored it so unquestionably, especially the nauseating ESPN, even though it is so absurdly inaccurate as to be laughable.
First off…no black people are being hung. None. A few have died by hanging this year but they committed suicide…they weren’t lynched no matter how badly the media wanted it to be true. There is not a plague of black people being hung in America and there hasn’t been since well before Doc Rivers was ever born. No one Doc Rivers knows or has ever known has ever been hung.
As for America not loving black people...that is so demonstrably untrue as to be absurd. Black people are so adored in American public life it is utterly astonishing. Everywhere you turn in American culture, be it music, movies, tv, sport or anywhere else, black people are vastly over-represented in relation to their population percentage.
Doc Rivers’ business, the NBA, is a perfect example. I could argue that Michael Jordan is the biggest star, sport or otherwise, to have dominated American culture in my lifetime. If it isn’t Michael Jordan, it may very well be Oprah Winfrey. At various times other black people have been the biggest stars in the country…Michael Jackson, Beyonce, Jay-Z, Bill Cosby, Denzel Washington, Will Smith, Muhammed Ali and on and on and on.
And of course, the most obvious rebuttal to Rivers’ refrain about American’s hatred of black people is that Barack Obama not only won two presidential elections in the last 12 years, but won them resoundingly. To put that into historical context…there have been as many black presidents in the 243 year history of the United States as there have been presidents who share my identity…Irish Catholic. In fact there has only ever been one Catholic president - Irish or otherwise, JFK…and if you’ll recall the Irish Catholic only served 2 years and 10 months in office while Obama served 8 years because it was the Irish Catholic president who was the victim of violence in office, not the black one.
The point being to all of this is that if America hates black people they sure as hell have a funny way of showing it.
NBA players were so shaken by the shooting of Jacob Blake they actually went on strike in protest. This protest strike was an emotionally driven piece of performative nonsense. The players weren’t so much protesting as having a tantrum. For players to be moved to such a drastic action over the Blake incident doesn’t make that incident egregious, it only makes their blind emotionalism readily apparent.
That said, I also have no time for people outraged by the NBA strike and respond to it by saying, “I’ll never watch a game again!” I obviously disagree with the NBA players regarding Jacob Blake and Black Lives Matter, but I also think that if you are going to protest then this is the way to do it. It would have been nice if the players had actually thought out their strike and the goals they actually wanted to achieve - and the fact that they don’t really have any achievable goals speaks to the vacuity of their cause. It also would have been beneficial if the players stood up for human rights in China earlier in the year - thus giving them some moral authority…but they didn’t and so they lack it. Regardless of all that…if you think players striking is an egregious form of protest there is no hope for you.
I always thought the same of Colin Kaepernick and his kneeling. I loathe the whole notion of flag fetishism and its accompanying militarism and think the anthem should not be played before any games, so I have never understood why Kaepernick’s kneeling was such a problem - it is simply a non-violent protest.
The WNBA also protested the Jacob Blake shooting by not playing their games, but no one noticed because no one gives a shit about that joke of a league and its dreadful product. What struck me about the WNBA protest was that all the players came out onto the court wearing a white t-shirt with seven painted on bloody bullet holes on the back in honor of Jacob Blake.
Think about that…WNBA players weren’t calling out police violence, they were actually honoring Jacob Blake, a guy who had an active warrant out for him for sexual assault against the woman whose call to police led to the shooting incident. So the WNBA think an alleged sexual assaulter is now a hero…good to know.
See this is the kind of thing that highlights the emotionalism, irrationality and utter madness of the entire Black Lives Matter movement and the racial moral panic gripping the nation.
Here is another example…Stephen A. Smith had a rant last week on ESPN where he called out the recent hiring of white Hall of Fame point guard Steve Nash, a two-time MVP, as the new head coach of the Brooklyn Nets as being a function of “white privilege”. Smith was incensed that Nash, who has no head coaching experience, would get hired over black coaches like Ty Lue who do have experience. Smith said that this (the hiring of an head coach with no experience) never happens for black people.
The uninformed may have been moved by Smith’s vacuous and emotionalist rant because it tells them what they want to hear, but what was most striking to me about the segment was that it was entirely factually incorrect.
I long ago stopped following the NBA very closely, and yet the second I heard Smith say that a black man has never been extended the opportunity that Nash had received, I immediately recalled that a black man HAD gotten that same opportunity FOR THAT SAME EXACT TEAM.
In 2014 the Brooklyn Nets hired Jason Kidd right after he retired from playing - in other words…Kidd had no coaching experience at all. While Kidd may “pass” for white as he is very light skinned, but just like Barrack Obama, he is black as his father was black. Let me add that it is horrifying to me that we as a society are now back in the truly ugly place of measuring a persons “blackness” to see if they qualify.
In addition, in 2014 Derek Fisher, a black man with no coaching experience who just retired from playing in the NBA, was hired by…the New York Knicks!
The fact that Stephen A. Smith, who considers himself a basketball expert and the ultimate New Yorker, either forgot or chose to forget, black players Jason Kidd and Derek Fisher having no coaching experience but getting hired as coaches in Brooklyn and New York, a fact that directly refutes his thesis of Nash’s white privilege, speaks volumes about the lack of integrity and dearth of emotionalism rampant in the media, especially around issues of race.
Which brings us back to Doc Rivers’ final point in his weepy post-game speech, which was about how “we are the ones being shot”. This sentiment fits nicely into something that LeBron James said recently in regard to the police. James said, “I know people get tired of hearing me say it, but we are scared as black people in America…black men, black women, black kids, we are terrified.”
LeBron should be scared, he should be absolutely terrified, but not of the police but of people who look like him, because Doc Rivers is right, black people are the ones being shot in America…but they are also the ones doing the shooting.
According to the CDC, homicide is the leading cause of death for black males aged 1 to 44. But of the 2,925 black people murdered in 2018, 2,600 of them, or 88%, were killed by other black people and 8% were killed by whites. Of the 3,499 whites murdered in 2018, 15.2% of them were killed by black people and 81% were killed by other whites.
In that same year, 228 black people were killed by cops…compared to 456 white people killed by cops. Cops kill more whites than blacks in raw numbers - whites are 72% of the population so that is not surprising, but when broken down not by population percentage but by percentage of police interaction, whites are still killed at a slightly higher rate than blacks.
The reason that there are so many police interactions with black people is revealed in the FBI crime statistics from 2018. The FBI stats show something else that is very disconcerting, and that is that black people commit an extraordinary amount of crimes, violent crimes in particular, especially considering that they make up a rather small percentage of the overall population.
For example, according to these 2018 FBI stats black people make up roughly 13% of the American population yet are arrested for 53.3% of homicides/non-negligent manslaughter, 28.6% of rapes, 54.2% of robberies, 33.7% of aggravated assaults, 29.4% of burglaries, 30% of larcenies, 37.4% of violent arsons and 32% of other assaults.
These statistics are extremely uncomfortable to discuss, in fact, these statistics are so uncomfortable both the Anti-Defamation League and the Southern Poverty Law Center have deemed referencing them to be “racist”. So, according to the ADL and SPLC, statistical reality is now racist.
When you look at the CDC and FBI statistics regarding black homicide rates and crime rates, the only logical conclusion to draw is that it would seem ‘black lives matter’ only on the rare occasion when white people or the police take them.
IDENTITY POLITICS DON’T MATTER
And this is why I abhor identity politics with a passion and believe it is killing this country. People are not representatives of some group, they are not their identities…they are individuals, each unique in their own right.
Identity politics believes that Dr. King’s dream of judging people by the content of their character and not the color of their skin, is, in fact, racist. Seeing people as individuals and not as identities is anathema to our current moment, and that is both tragic and frightening because all it does is dehumanize and elevates the worst among us, and diminish the best.
For instance, the black people I know are not represented on those FBI crime statistics. The black people I know are are not murderous criminals living the thug life, they are thoughtful, sensitive, kind and compassionate human beings. (It should also be mentioned that the two cops I know (one of whom is black) are not skull cracking, trigger happy, authoritarian douchebags either, they are just normal guys living normal lives.)
But if you are going to demand that people be identified solely by their race or ethnicity, then that identification comes with the burden of that race or ethnicity’s shadow. In the case of black people, that means the FBI crime statistics showing an alarming amount of criminality in the black community.
Race hustlers peddling the vapid Critical Race Theory like Barbara DiAngelo (White Fragility) and Ibram X. Kendi (How to be Anti-Racist) are having great success doing the same thing to whites, teaching everyone that not only are all whites inherently racist, but that every institution in America is as well.
Of course, this hyper-racialization dehumanizes the individual and imposes a needless barrier between whites and blacks while removing all agency from blacks and cynically exploiting white guilt for profit.
This approach does not diminish “racism” at all but instead accentuates divisions and heightens hatred.
There’s a reason that corporate America has been so quick to jump on the BLM bandwagon, and it isn’t because they are excited for monumental change in America. Corporate America embracing BLM is a dead give away that the movement is a mirage. Corporate America is using Black Lives Matter as a form of cheap grace…where it can signal its empty virtue and then merrily go on about its dirty business.
What Black Lives Matter does is take the focus off of police brutality or economic issues and put the focus on race. Once something becomes about race it stops being about anything else. BLM makes enemies out of potential allies by making everything about race instead of focusing on commonalities that cross racial and ethnic boundaries and have more to do with class.
If BLM were serious, their protests would have a very clear objective. Right now, BLM protestors say “defund the police” but then say that isn’t what they really mean. Or they hold up signs saying “no hate” or “racism sucks” or some other vacuous bumper sticker slogan.
An actual serious proposal to address police brutality would be to demand an increase in funding to police rather than a demand to defund. Police need more money to hire more officers and to do more training, as former Navy SEAL Jocko Willink recently stated, police need to spend at least 25% of their time training.
Police need to have it drilled into them how to deescalate situations and also how to be much more effective and efficient with their hands, thus reducing the need to use a weapon. It would be a very good idea for all cops to be serious martial artists heavily schooled in Judo or Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.
Cops should also be better paid, better trained and more thoroughly vetted in order to weed out those with a nefarious personal agenda or psychological dysfunction.
If BLM proposed those things, then maybe that would be an indication that they were serious about actually addressing the issue of police brutality, but they don’t and they aren’t.
“Black Lives Matter”, just like its animating philosophy Critical Race Theory, is meant to be not only frustratingly amorphous but intentionally divisive, and that is why corporate America, the media and the establishment love it. As long as Black Lives Matter is front and center, the corruption of business as usual can continue unabated and the vast majority of Americans, who are working class and poor and who are a glorious melting pot of black, white, Latino, Asian, gay, straight and on and on and on, will continue to suffer at the hands of both the police and the corporate class.
What needs to happen for poor and working class people is to drop the Black Lives Matter nonsense and instead focus on things that could actually improve all of their lives…like universal health care. Universal health care would benefit poor and working class people of all races, and protests in favor of it would not be infused with the divisive and frantic emotion of the race based BLM movement, and thus be less likely to lead to rioting and looting, both of which are extraordinarily self-defeating.
The reality is that Black Lives Matter with its emotionalist, irrational hyper-racialization isn’t addressing the suffering of black Americans or any other type of Americans, it is guaranteeing it.
Until we start seriously addressing both the economic issues of poor and working class people and the inadequacies of law enforcement, then nothing of any substance will ever change.
NO LIVES MATTER
This is why I say, No Lives Matter.
No Lives Matter because the truth of our existence is that we are all completely disposable yet entirely irreplaceable. We are all flawed and fragile creatures stumbling through the dark hurtling toward our own demise.
Regardless of our race, gender, ethnicity or any other secondary characteristic, to quote JFK, “we all must inhabit this small planet, we all cherish our children’s future and we are all mortal”. The bottom line is that we all bleed when we are cut, and we all grieve when heartbroken, and we all want a better world for our children than the one we have had to endure. This is what we share…this is what brings us together…the fleetingness of the human experience and the enormous existential humility that imposes upon us.
If we can embrace that humility and recognize that all of us come from dust, and to the dust we will all inevitably return, then maybe we can stop with the incessant dehumanization in our culture that labels us black beings or white beings instead of human beings, each illuminated by the light of God or truth or love or peace that dwells deep within us all.
Until we recognize and celebrate the oceans of our commonalities as opposed to the raindrops of our differences, then no lives will ever matter…not black lives, not blue lives, not a single life.
©2020
