I am not going to pretend that this country has moved on from is racist roots. I won't. I'm from western Pennsylvania and went to college in central Pennsylvania. Ever big wheel truck there has a confederate flag license plate, and not because they like General Lee. Racism is certainly alive and well in America. But can we cry racism here? I won't come to any hard conclusions because I wasn't there. But I do want to propose giving our peace officers the benefit of the doubt.
If my neighbors saw me banging on my door they might call the cops. My neighbors don't know me. Now if a cop shows up to investigate a potential break in, I am going to be on my best behavior. I have been taught to absolutely respect the authority of the police. If I begin yelling at the officer or accusing him of things, I show myself as a potential threat and can then be detained. I can also be detained if I am getting in the way of the officer completing his duty. The difference between this hypothetical situation and the one that occurred on the 16th is that I am a caucasian male and Professor Gates is an African American. There is something referred to in race studies as white privilege. This states that I will be given more benefit of doubt than an african american would, all things being equal aside from race. I would love to believe that this is just theory but if you look close enough at our society you will see it. This is another blog entry all to its own.
There are two versions of the story. Gates' version and the arresting Officer Crowley's version. And my mother in her infinite wisdom told me, "in divorce there are always two sides, and neither is the complete truth. You'll find elements of truth in both, but neither will be all the way." I have no doubt that it is true in this situation as well.
"The police and Professor Gates offered differing accounts of what happened after officers arrived. Professor Gates said that he had shown photo identification to Sergeant Crowley but that the sergeant had appeared not to believe that he lived there. Frustrated, Professor Gates said, he asked for the name and badge number of Sergeant Crowley, who, he said, refused to give them.
By the police account, Professor Gates initially refused to show identification, and Sergeant Crowley did provide his name. When told that Sergeant Crowley was investigating the possibility of a break-in, the police said, Professor Gates yelled, “Why, because I’m a black man in America?” and accused the sergeant of racism. Professor Gates followed the officer from the inside of the house onto the porch, yelling at him, the police report said."
---Harvard Scholar Won’t Be Charged By KATIE ZEZIMA and ABBY GOODNOUGH NYTIMES
The situation ended with the professor being arrested and initially charged with disorderly conduct. The charges have since been dropped. But the situation has been blown up and has reignited the racial discussion. Even the President has weighed in on the situation.
"I don't know, not having been there and not seeing all the facts, what role race played," Obama said Wednesday night while taking questions after a White House news conference. "But I think it's fair to say, No. 1, any of us would be pretty angry; No. 2, that the Cambridge police acted stupidly in arresting somebody when there was already proof that they were in their own home; and, No. 3 ... that there's a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately."
I applaud Obama for not making a judgement call and admitting that he did not know "not having been there and not seeing all of the facts." This shows good temperament. And he's right. I would've been angry in that situation. But his number two bothers me. To come out and accused the police of "act[ing] stupidly" immediately after admitting that he "did not know" seems contradictory and political. The charge he was arrested for was disorderly conduct after the proof was presented. He wasn't arrested for being in his own home.
All things considered, breaking into your own home isn't illegal. But a responding officer has an obligation to get the entire story, thus must be allowed to do a thorough investigation. If someone breaks into my house and when the responding officer shows up, the burglar says he is my house sitter and the officer leaves allowing him to steal my computers and music equipment, I would be far more pissed off than if he had put me in cuffs and sat me down out of his way to complete his investigation.
If we begin to second guess our police forces, as we have for a while now, we take their authority away. Many of us don't like the police. They get in our way when we are late by pulling us over for speeding in a school zone. They arrest us when we act stupid downtown after drinking a little too much. We jokingly, or not so jokingly, call them pigs. But why do we have police forces in the first place? They are there to protect and serve. The police officer who responded to the call was doing his job. If we assume that the arrest was racially motivated then we have to suspect everything the police do. If we can't assume that our police will uphold the law then why do we have them? Have their been cops that have abused their authority? Yes. Are there cops who are still cops that abuse their power? Yes. Is every police officer subject to suspicion? No. By giving them the badge we trust them to always tell the truth and to uphold the honor of that badge. They have earned our trust by completing the academy and completing their training. When we take it away, we give strength to the criminals they are trying to protect us against.
In conclusion, I have no idea what went on a week ago in the living room of Gates' house. I hope the officer was doing his job, for his sake and society's. We need to remember that with the badge comes our trust, without it the police are useless.
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