James Maynard believes we need to be addressing the insidious violence that exists within our own community.
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Imagine, if you will for just a moment that you are walking down the street and suddenly you are accosted by a man with the authority to detain you. Perhaps he carries a toxic mix of fear, power and the ability to control your own destiny as well as a seeming contempt for you based on little more than the color of your skin or your cultural background. Perhaps you were breaking the law or not, maybe you have done some bad things but nothing warranting the death penalty. Or perhaps you have never broken a law in your life. At this point, it doesn’t seem to matter to the officer with your life in his hands or the way that this crucial moment may play out. You know that your very life is now out of your hands, and firmly in his. You also know that if you struggle, this will turn bad. If you run, it will get worse. If you try to explain, qualify your innocence or your decency as a person or exert your rights, it will only increase suspicion and aggravate him. If you do not resist and just comply, this may still end badly. What should you do? What can you do? And what was your crime, warranting such harassment, arrest or, increasingly, assault or even death? Driving while black? Walking while black? Wearing a hoodie while black? Or, sometimes, just trying to open the front door to your own home or searching for help after a car accident while black? All recent examples of excessive police force against an unarmed black community. And all, absolutely unacceptable. Perhaps we also have a problem with white violence.
At what point do we begin to acknowledge the problem with white culture in North America and the violence that we love to pretend does not exist?
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To suggest, as the media often does by defaming the victims, that this is somehow solely the fault of these black men or the black community, both young and old, completely innocent or not is a moral and social outrage. And it is the tragic result of their constant harassment and demonization, sometimes with fatal consequences, by a largely white community of media outlets, law enforcement, discriminatory legal systems and self-appointed citizen vigilantes. Does the perceived suspicion of these often innocent victims really demand such a cruel, aggressive and fatal response? We seem to have different standards resulting in recurring tragedy for only certain communities in this country and are doing far too little to address the discrimination simply because we have been led to believe, over many generations, that they are the offenders and we in the white community are the potential victims. So, any potential loss, even of innocence, is tacitly accepted as collateral damage in an ongoing cultural war that we, the majority, created in the first place, historically, socially, culturally.
At what point do we begin to acknowledge the problem with white culture in North America and the violence that we love to pretend does not exist? This has become a taboo subject in North America, off limits. Instead, it seems just fine to discuss it as an issue of black youth or black males, once again placing the blame on the victims in these specific crimes. As a white man, I am disgusted by what I see going on around me and the general malaise that the white community has about the growing, or dare I say, longstanding issues with white male violence in our countries and communities. I have been actively observing this phenomenon for many years now and have had my suspicions repeatedly confirmed that as the perceived “moral majority”, we strive not only to demonize certain minority communities but we also work very hard to deflect any responsibility from our own. I have witnessed this pattern repeated throughout my life.
While the vast majority of school and public shootings and mass murders in North America are committed by white men no one is calling for us to address the problems in our own community.
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Case in point, whenever there is a crime involving a white person, race is rarely identified in the media and never discussed as a relevant factor. However, whenever a crime is committed by someone other than a white person, the race is always identified and often becomes an important focus of the story. Watch the stories in your local or national papers for a month and you will begin to notice this pattern emerge. What this indicates to me is that we have a built-in prejudice against anyone outside of the white community and, at the same time, are unwilling to take responsibility for white violence. Crime rates and sentencing patterns also affirm discriminatory practices in the justice system penalizing non-whites at much higher rates for similar crimes. In effect, we rarely hear specifically about white people associated with crime while we always hear about the other. And when white crime does happen, as it often does, we see a common justification; there may be a few bad apples, but it is nothing to worry about. In fact, it’s not even worth discussing.
While the vast majority of school and public shootings and mass murders in North America are committed by white men no one is calling for us to address the problems in our own community. No one is vilifying the terrifying white man on the nightly news or demanding a police crackdown on those savage or thuggish communities. No one is suggesting that we ban immigration from white Western nations or calling for a commission on how to deal with the growing problem of white male violence. I have yet to see an exposé on Fox, CNN or MSNBC on how the white community can address its own excessive male violence. In fact, white serial offenders are often treated better than black victims in the media as shown in a recent exposé by the Huffington Post and any suggestion that there may be a problem within the white community is immediately met with an angry defensive chorus of ‘you can’t make this into a racial issue’ or ‘you are politicizing this for your own liberal agenda’.
It is time that we all take a good hard look at white culture as well as other cultures that condone violence, locally and globally.
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As a white man, I am often ashamed by what I see perpetrated by my fellow brothers and sisters, especially regarding the brothers and sisters of other races, cultures, religions and countries. It is a travesty of my culture with a long self-righteous history of domination that we still justify our own aggression by pointing fingers at others rather than addressing our own growing problems. At the same time we keep on vilifying the other and excusing our fear, hatred and self-defense as a reasonable response or the right to stand your ground. Meanwhile, the innocent keep on dying, too often at the hands of white people. It is time that we all take a good hard look at white culture as well as other cultures that condone violence, locally and globally. That is absolutely not to say that violence does not exist in other racial or cultural groups, it does. But the constant vilification and cultural mythology around certain groups seen as outside of the Western normative keeps us relentlessly and aggressively focused outside of ourselves rather than addressing the insidious violence that can also exist within our own community.
I can only hope that justice will be served according to the facts rather than the social or political climate of the day. In too many cases, it seems that the police protect their own and the justice system, judges and juries protect the status quo while innocent people keep on dying as we have seen in the Trayvon Martin case, the Jonathon Ferrell case and many many others. Let us collectively mourn the tragic death of Michael Brown rather than further enflaming an already grieving and angry community. Let’s pray that justice prevails and we can begin to address the systemic problems within each community together, my own included. Until that happens, in the name of peace and justice, I for one, as a white man, just want to say I am truly sorry for your tragic loss and I stand with you to make a positive change.
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Photo: AP/Sid Hastings
@ Mr. James Maynard I think it is always good to listen to the story of both sides. A policeman without any negative record during his 6 years of service fires his handgun 6 times, killing a ‘kid’ out of nothing. This story does not make any sense. Please let me say, that a man, 18+, 6ft4in, very large is an adult and not a ‘kid’. It seems after stealing and attacking an employee of a shop he is not even a ‘good kid’, just my opinion. Yes, this ‘kid’ had no gun, but he was violently attacking this policeman.… Read more »
I’m curious as to what you say to the employees and business owners where their business were looted? The business owners who have lost substantial income because of the riots?
Really? That’s a little too convenient. I am not speaking from a place of guilt but rather outrage at the complete injustice of yet another unarmed black kid being shot to death in the street, repeatedly, in what has become a regular occurrence in this country. I am speaking to my anger at the complicity of government, law enforcement and major media in this country that most often seeks to demonize the black community and its victims, even in times of tragedy rather than punishing those that have perpetuated these tragedies. I am speaking to the anger that there is… Read more »
As a white man, you don’t speak for me. Your guilt is your own.
The police distrust everyone, to a degree, because they tend to interact with the public when those civilians are acting at their worst and much of that interaction involves potential danger. Yet, we are all animals and on the animal farm all animals are equal, but some are more equal than others. The simplest division, or discrimination if you want to use that word, is gender, not race. When cop shoots man, that is not news and we shed comparatively fewer tears and demonstrate comparatively less rage and fewer protests. Men are known to be the most disposable entities, because… Read more »
The police distrust everyone, to a degree, because they tend to interact with the public when those civilians are acting at their worst and much of that interaction involves potential danger. Yet, we are all animals and on the animal farm all animals are equal, but some are more equal than others. The simplest division, or discrimination if you want to use that word, is gender, not race. When cop shoots man, that is not news and we shed comparatively fewer tears and demonstrate comparatively less rage and fewer protests. Men are known to be the most disposable entities, because… Read more »
Amen. Thank you for your thoughts!
I keep wondering if discrimination against black people is the underlying cause of this distrust from the police why aren’t black women being killed in equal numbers.
very good point
I think the simple answer to this one of many complex questions around this issue is that men have come to be defined as perpetrators and women have not. When you add race, culture and religion into the mix, it still remains men that are seen as the primary perpetrators of all things violent. Therefore, women are rarely identified as a threat.