Shout and Shoot: The American Police State
A few weeks ago a friend challenged me to speak up on Ferguson, and other incidents of police violence against black people. I admitted to him that doing so is difficult as a white person: injecting myself into issues involving race when I come from a position of undeniable privilege is often awkward and difficult.
Yet here I am. Not just because I made a promise, but because white and LGBT silence helps perpetuates the violence. But, I still wrestled with how to discuss this for weeks, because one of the most horrifying incidents happened literally a mile from me while I sat at work.
On August 6th, 2014, John Crawford III left his home in Fairfield Ohio to go to the Walmart in Beavercreek to buy a pellet rifle (BB gun). The store is in a mostly white middle class suburb of Dayton, and caters to the people working at Wright Patterson Air Force base. He picked one up off a shelf at the store that had already been taken out of the box, stopped in front of a display, and talked with LeeCee Johnson (the mother of their two children together) on his cell phone.
When the police showed up, they yelled at him to drop the weapon, then began firing before John even realized who the police were yelling at. LeeCee and Crawford's father listened helplessly on the cell phone while he gasped out, "Dad! Dad!," desperately fought for breath, and died.
He died struggling for air, died despite having done absolutely nothing wrong, died not knowing why.
US Military Rules for Escalation of Force
However, viewing the two videos above, the rules of engagement for police officers seems to look a lot more like this:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brynn-tannehill/shout-and-shoot-martial-l_1_b_6288954.html?utm_hp_ref=gay-voices
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