Sunday, April 26, 2015
When will the race debate in America end? Toni Morrison says it's far from over.
Updated by Rachel Huggins on April 26, 2015, 2:10 p.m. ET rachel.huggins@vox.com
Don't miss stories. Follow Vox!
That uncomfortable, cringeworthy conversation on race that everyone always talks about? Toni Morrison wants to have it — and isn't pulling any punches.
In an interview with The Telegraph's Gaby Wood on Morrison's new novel, God Help The Child, the Nobel prize-winning author explained when we'll know the conversation on race can come to an end.
"People keep saying, 'We need to have a conversation about race,'" she said. "This is the conversation. I want to see a cop shoot a white unarmed teenager in the back. And I want to see a white man convicted for raping a black woman. Then when you ask me, 'Is it over?', I will say yes."
Morrison's remarks reflect the frustration and growing furor over the highly publicized string of unarmed black men who've died at the hands of white officers, from Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri; to Eric Garner in New York City; to Freddie Gray in Baltimore.
Toni Morrison was right: African Americans don't trust cops to dole out equal justice
African Americans make up only 13 percent of the US population, but are killed by police at disproportionately higher rates than other races. Data suggests that police are 21 times more likely to kill black teens than white teens.
So Morrison's dismal view isn't at all surprising. In fact, it's echoed throughout the black community. Take Ferguson, for instance. The protests that broke out after Michael Brown was killed by police officer Darren Wilson last August didn't occur in a vacuum. A March Department of Justice report showed the deep roots of residents' frustration: city officials balance their local budget by targeting low-income black residents with fines and court fees and police disproportionately arrest and use force on black residents.
Morrison implied that she is waiting for the criminal justice system to treat white people as it does black people. She's not alone in her distrust of the system.
According to Gallup poll data, 37 percent of African Americans trust in police officers "a great deal" compared to 59 percent of white Americans.
And according to a 2013 Pew Research Center survey, 70 percent of black Americans believe they are treated less fairly than whites during encounters with police. Meanwhile, 37 percent of white people said they think black people are treated less fairly by police.
On Saturday yet another protest — in yet another city — broke out over the death of Freddie Gray, a 25-year-old black man from Baltimore who died April 19 after suffering a fatal spinal cord injury while in police custody. Police have admitted they did not get Gray timely medical care when he asked for it. The protesters want justice. They want answers. And they want proof that this won't happen again.
Until then, the conversation won't stop.
Card 1 of 15 Launch cards
What are the Ferguson protests about?
The protests began with the death of Michael Brown, an 18-year-old black man who was shot and killed by police officer Darren Wilson in Ferguson, Missouri, on August 9, 2014. Brown, who was college-bound and had no criminal record, was unarmed, although local police accused him of robbing a convenience store moments before the shooting.
Brown's killing and the subsequent events in Ferguson have become a national controversy touching on much larger national issues of race, justice, and police violence.
The shooting almost immediately triggered protests in the St. Louis suburb, as demonstrators took to the streets to speak out against what many saw as yet another example of police brutality against young black men, for which Ferguson has a troubling record.
Tears roll down the cheek of Lesley McSpadden, the mother of slain teenager Michael Brown. (Scott Olson / Getty Images)
The situation subsequently escalated and drew national attention when police reacted to protesters, even those acting peacefully, with military-grade equipment, such as armored vehicles, tear gas, rubber bullets, and sound cannons.
One of major demands of protesters was to get prosecutors to put Wilson on trial for the Brown shooting. But a grand jury decided not to indict Wilson after three months of deliberations — in what many saw as a deeply flawed, biased investigation led by local officials with close ties to law enforcement.
The investigation into the shooting, inherently secretive grand jury proceedings, and subsequent reactions by local officials further worsened ties between local residents and their government, which is controlled by mostly white politicians despite Ferguson's majority black population.
The events in Ferguson captured national attention because, in many ways, they're indicative of the racial disparities many Americans, particularly minorities, see in the criminal justice system on a daily basis. While the specifics of the Brown shooting involve just one teen and one police officer in a small St. Louis suburb, the circumstances surrounding Brown's death replicate a fear commonly held by many parents — that black lives matter less, particularly in the face of increasingly heavily armed police who have tremendous legal freedom in whether they can shoot a suspect they merely perceive as dangerous.
13 things you should know about the Michael Brown shooting 15 Cards / Edited By German Lopez Updated Mar 6, 2015, 11:30p
0 comments:
Post a Comment