Mourners, in an all-too-familiar scene, remembered Mike Brown and victims of police brutality with a vigil. To stop the need for these somber gatherings, should taxpayers demand a zero-tolerance law?
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“I surrender,” said David Rose, a hefty black man with a bald head and a straight face, “it’s too much, it’s just too much.”
His solemnly demeanor spoke loudly of frustration, sadness and hopelessness, though he remained relatively quiet, uttering only a few words… “It has to stop… It just has to stop.”
Though not a father, Mr. Rose is an uncle to black boys and he, like the hundreds who gathered in Love Park for the National Moment of Silence 2014, wants to see an immediate end to the “abuse” of black bodies at the hands of rogue police officers.
“When are they going to sentence the police for indiscriminately killing our youth?” shouted North Philadelphian Mr. Jondhi Harrell, who stood just feet from Mr. Rose’s statuesque-like body. “Across the country young black men are being killed. These are our sons; when our sons can’t walk the streets… what kind a society are we? We’re being treated like second-class citizens in our own country!”
Before the vigil began, I overheard a group of black mothers discussing the orders they give their sons so that they can return home in one piece.
Unfortunately, the murder of Mike Brown has once again sparked the conversation surrounding what black parents should say to their children about police interactions and the unspoken code of existing while black in America.
And though I agree the conversation about racism, classism, police brutality and corruption should take place, it shouldn’t be between parent and child. Instead, the dialogue should between taxpayer and lawmaker and it should go like this:
“I want a zero tolerance law put on the books that says any police officer who kills an unarmed citizen, regardless of race or reason, is stripped of their badge and given life without parole.”
CLICK PHOTO to read “The Lies We Tell Black Boys and the Truth They Deserve to Hear.”
I, too, want to see an end to the culture of police brutality, but training black kids to make the best of the inevitable isn’t going to change anything, and, in my opinion, its more brutal than a baton to the brain.
Police are employees of the people, so make the demands, make them plain and don’t be silenced. For we who believe in freedom cannot rest!
Thanks for reading. Until next time, I’m Flood the Drummer® & I’m Drumming for JUSTICE!™