African American
Related: About this forumWhat I Learned About Stop-and-Frisk From Watching My Black Son
When I heard that my 21-year-old son, a student at Harvard, had been stopped by New York City police on more than one occasion during the brief summer he spent as a Wall Street intern, I was angry. On one occasion, while wearing his best business suit, he was forced to lie face-down on a filthy sidewalk becausewell, lets be honest about it, because of the color of his skin. As an attorney and a college professor who teaches criminal justice classes, I knew that his constitutional rights had been violated. As a parent, I feared for his safety at the hands of the policea fear that I feel every single day, whether he is in New York or elsewhere.
Moreover, as the white father of an African-American son, I am keenly aware that I never face the suspicion and indignities that my son continuously confronts. In fact, all of the men among my African-American in-lawsand I literally mean every single one of themcan tell multiple stories of unjustified investigatory police stops of the sort that not a single one of my white male relatives has ever experienced.
In The Atlantics April feature story Is Stop-and-Frisk Worth It? author Daniel Bergner cited Professor Frank Zimrings notion that stop-and-frisk is a special tax on minority males. I cannot endorse the conclusion that this special tax actually helps make communities safer. As indicated by the competing perspectives in Atlantic essays by Donald Braman and Paul Larkin, scholars disagree on whether crime rate data actually substantiate the claims of stop-and-frisk advocates. Either way, I do believe that the concept of a special tax deserves closer examination.
Proponents of stop-and-frisk often suggest that the hardships suffered by young men of color might be tolerable if officers were trained to be polite rather than aggressive and authoritarian. We need to remember, however, that we are talking about imposing an additional burden on a demographic that already experiences a set of alienating taxes not shared by the rest of society.
http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2014/04/what-i-learned-about-stop-and-frisk-from-watching-my-black-son/359962/?utm_source=dig
Please, for the love of god, do *NOT* read the comments below...
1StrongBlackMan
(31,849 posts)And you know what I liked about it most? The white guy actually saying, "I know it's real but I cannot imagine what it's like." Further, he doesn't seek to lecture his Black son on how it is his (the sons) problem to solve.
JI7
(89,264 posts)or at least what some would think .
that he shouldn't complain because he goes to a school like harvard and is interning at wall street(they would probably go so far as to say he is the real problem in society).
that they don't have a job, enough money or whatever the fuck and that they are the real victims.
not realizing or ignoring that this isn't just about this one student. that kids at all levels put up with this everyday because of their race.