The Right to Resist: How Will YOU Fight Police Brutality?

[damnedifIknow]

Activist/organizer Lumumba Akinwole-Bandele on the need to challenge the right of police to terrorize our communities"

By now, we have all seen the video of Eric Garner’s murder at the hands of the NYPD. As we are still trying to make sense of his killing, we receive the news of two more murders of unarmed Black men by law enforcement. Twenty-two-year old John Crawford, shot and killed in Walmart in Beavercreek, Ohio for holding in his hand a BB gun that was being sold in the store. Unarmed 18-year-old Michael Brown, gunned down by a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri."

*Those who have never had to deal firsthand with the reality of police violence often ask, why not just cooperate? Why resist? Why did he run? A long and recent history tells us any encounter with the police is typically just the beginning of a series of dehumanizing and probably violent experiences. We should not be surprised when victims of police violence “resist” not arrest, but consistent police misconduct. That resisting may come in many forms. For Eric Gardner it was a simple statement - “This stops today.”

* What are a people who experience consistent systemic forms of violence at the hands of law enforcement and are just as consistently denied any justice expected to do? Nearly 49 years ago to this day, Watts, California went up in flames in response to police terror. As America turns it attention to the rage in and around Ferguson, Missouri this week, rest assured that unless this pattern of police killing stops, there are sure to be other cities in line for similar uprisings. If we are concerned about the possibility of similar uprisings, we have a responsibility to make sure the overpolicing, brutality and killings in our communities end. "

How will you resist?"

http://www.ebony.com/news-views/the-right-to-resist-how-will-you-fight-police-brutality-403

[randys1]

1. Eric is already old news, here is another

http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/crime-and-courts/michael-brown-remembered-as-a-gentle-giant/article_cbafa12e-7305-5fd7-8e0e-3139f472d130.html


never fucking ends, and no dont mean he is old news but you know what i mean

Brown, 18, died Saturday after a Ferguson police officer shot him multiple times outside an apartment complex. Brown was two days from starting class at Vatterott College. Close friends had been packing up and departing for schools such as Kansas State University and Arkansas Baptist University on sports scholarships.

[merrily]

2. For one thing, victims and their loved ones need to file more lawsuits under

42 USC 1983. I believe that is the law Rodney King sued under.

U.S. Code › Title 42 › Chapter 21 › Subchapter I › § 1983
42 U.S. Code § 1983 - Civil action for deprivation of rights

Current through Pub. L. 113-142, except 128. (See Public Laws for the current Congress.)



Every person who, under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, of any State or Territory or the District of Columbia, subjects, or causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States or other person within the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress, except that in any action brought against a judicial officer for an act or omission taken in such officer’s judicial capacity, injunctive relief shall not be granted unless a declaratory decree was violated or declaratory relief was unavailable. For the purposes of this section, any Act of Congress applicable exclusively to the District of Columbia shall be considered to be a statute of the District of Columbia

.

Winning a lawsuit is cold comfort if your loved one is gone. But, I believe that dollars paid by cities and towns--and the cops themselves--will have an impact that will help prevent future murders by law enforcement.

Then we all have to make sure the judgments get publicized. It's one thing to love your first responders and talk about "law and order." It's another to imagine your property taxes going up and up to pay for this kind of thing by law enforcement.

This can be a crisis of conscience for Democrats in particular. Union members, especially members of public unions, were reliably Democratic back in the day. I believe we lost a lot of police, firefighters, etc. when the left started to push back against police brutality during the 60s and 70s. Giuliani, however, proved there is more than one way to lose the support of first responders.

In my mind, there is no issue. We simply cannot stand still for this. But, I imagine that some might think twice. Let your higher self rule.