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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsPolice gunned down 12-year-old, newspaper decides to run this story . . .
TAMIR RICE'S FATHER HAS HISTORY OF DOMESTIC VIOLENCE
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/11/26/tamir-rice-father_n_6227312.html?&ir=Politics
We've seen this type of media coverage before, though it's often focused on the victims of police violence themselves, rather than on their relatives. After the deaths of Trayvon Martin in 2012 and Michael Brown in August, for example, some news stories evidently sought to paint the slain teenagers as drug addicts, delinquents and thugs.
This coverage was criticized by many as an attempt to smear the victims' characters and distract from the issue of police violence -- and, more subtly, to suggest that the killing of young black men is somehow acceptable or unsurprising. And it succeeded -- these stories were used by some people to explain why Martin and Brown deserved to die, or how they may have somehow invited their own deaths.
Brandon Blackwell, the author of the story about Tamir's father, was the subject of heavy critique on Twitter once the piece went live. He told one critic that he's also planning to report on the officer who killed Tamir.
snip
Rather than asking why police officers were so quick to exercise lethal force on a 12-year-old boy playing with a toy gun, as 12-year-old boys everywhere do, some people are asking instead how Tamir's parents could have allowed their child to get his hands on a fake weapon in the first place. Instead of focusing on how young black males face a far greater risk of being killed by police than their white peers, they blame the grieving parents -- a mother and father who, whatever their legal history, will be going to sleep tonight without their son.
Bettie
(16,124 posts)of "proving" that he, like every other black male who gets shot, was 100% responsible for his own death.
Victim blaming seems to be the thing to do these days.
Disgusting.
BronxBoy
(2,286 posts)You can almost set your watch by it
WillyT
(72,631 posts)noiretextatique
(27,275 posts)for the ever-present "just the facts" cop-apologist crowd. they will gleefully parrot every negative comment written about this child in their zeal the defend the indefensible.
arcane1
(38,613 posts)freshwest
(53,661 posts)The 'reporter' had no linkage between the father and the son being killed.
It was a smear on a dead child.
GGJohn
(9,951 posts)12 yo child gets executed by a cop and they run this story?
Words fail me.
frylock
(34,825 posts)SomethingFishy
(4,876 posts)he's just a small kid, doesn't look very "demonic" so they had to go after his family...
Unfuckingbelievable..
Enrique
(27,461 posts)the newspaper is conveying the message that the boy was doomed. Painting a picture of the boy's home life that makes people think he had no future anyway so the death is not as important as it might have been, if it were a boy that the reader can relate to.
gollygee
(22,336 posts)That's the exact point though. They're pointing a picture of him being doomed, taking fault away from the police, suggesting if he hadn't died at their hand he was doomed anyway, so it's nothing to get too upset about.
He wasn't doomed. If he hadn't been shot, he'd be celebrating Thanksgiving tomorrow.
arcane1
(38,613 posts)Enrique
(27,461 posts)and a lot of people no doubt skip right to that step.
Rex
(65,616 posts)Their crying over a fake gun is pathetic. How did he get a TOY? Gee can't imagine. Huff is solid garbage anyway.
GGJohn
(9,951 posts)And why did the cop execute Tamir?
Rex
(65,616 posts)Parents, friends, etc.. Why did the cop execute Tamir? No idea, watching the video they didn't even try to see if it was a toy...just pulled up and killed him.
Your guess is as good as mine.
arcane1
(38,613 posts)I would be foolish for doing so, of course, but I probably would.
Rex
(65,616 posts)And these were sold as looking like real guns, the red ring was small and could only be seen if pointing in your direction. Yet, nobody ever got shot by cops or anyone else for that matter.
Things have changed a lot since the 1980s, but kids still play the same games with fake guns so I don't get all these police killings.
GGJohn
(9,951 posts)I remember back in the 50's, we had those realistic looking cap gun revolvers and the cops never gave us a second glance.
Difference times, sigh.
Rex
(65,616 posts)I wonder how much of that fear and uncertainty is still with us as a people?
arcane1
(38,613 posts)And cops are receiving military-style training in addition to all the toys and vehicles they get from the government.
GGJohn
(9,951 posts)but police depts are hiring combat vets who treat citizens like the enemy, and, to top it off, alot of police are NG's who were called to active duty and served multiple combat tours and returned to treat, again, citizens like the enemy.
GGJohn
(9,951 posts)nomorenomore08
(13,324 posts)noiretextatique
(27,275 posts)fear and terror and fear and terror and fear and terror...24/7.
Rex
(65,616 posts)The POTUS comes out and says they are all 'patriots and good people' and the confusion and uncertainty sets in. Or he says we are a 'nation of laws', while Wall Street gets away with decades of grand theft and the confusion sets in.
ecstatic
(32,731 posts)Iggo
(47,565 posts)montana_hazeleyes
(3,424 posts)in the 50's, pointed it at everyone all the time. He was never profiled or killed about it.
And the gall of them bringing up domestic violence by a relative. WHAT does that have to do with the situation ?
And don't they know there is a high rate of domestic violence and alcohol abuse amongst Law Enforcement?
I am married to a Black man for many years. We have several children. Three of them are big, strong, males.
They are now in their forties. I have lived the fear of them being murdered by cops all these decades and still do. I worry for my daughters too.
Now the fear will be worse.