"This is what happens to black men in America!"
HENRY LOUIS GATES JR.,according to a police report; the African-American scholar was arrested outside his home near Harvard University after a woman reported seeing a man try to pry open his front door
No Henry. You were not arrested outside your home because you "am a black man in America". There are a whole lot of black American men who will never be arrested outside their own homes. More importantly, thousands of white men in America are arrested outside there homes everyday.
Not because they are white or black but because we live in a police state.
That's what happens to people who take their shoes off at airports and condone illegal occupations and torture. They gradually acquiesce to repressive control by an ever powerful government. Your Pavlovian regurgitation of simple minded Post Civil Rights racial memes are nothing more than ammunition for the Hegelian head fake of manufactured polemics and tactical apologia that pacifies the herd with the familiar white v. black paradigm.Were Henry Gates the lumber manager at Home Depot and arrested outside his home in Landover MD, this story wouldn't have made the local paper. The implication is that because a black professor at Harvard (Plantation symbolism / Establishment endorsement) is not immune to the consequences of for-profit policing, racism is demonstrated to be perceptively more strident.
Henry Gates arrested outside his home is not a racial incident. It is a For-Profit Prison incident.
The Plantation encourages Plantation Negros and Plantation Crackas to blame the erosion of their civil liberties and violation of their human rights on the color of their skin. Instead of pointing his finger square at a for-profit police state and an apologist media that promotes fear to validate a power grabbing government, Henry sticks to the Cuz Iz Bwak mantra.
“I said, ‘Are you not giving me your name and badge number because I’m a black man in America?’ . . . He treated my request with scorn.’’Gates also said he was suffering from a bronchial infection and was physically unable to yell.
Furthermore, Gates said that as a man who is “half white,’’ who was married to a white woman for more than two decades, and whose children are part white, “I don’t walk around calling white people racist. . . . Nobody knows me as some lunatic black nationalist who’s walking around beating up on white people. This is just not my profile.’’
44 comments:
Nah... If he was white he wouldn't have been arrested. Period. There is validity in what your espousing but in THIS particular case those two individuals wanted to "try"to put a Negro who they clearly viewed as superior in a position of inferiority to soothe their penis envy. That's it.
Denmark Vesey IS School!!!
"For-Profit Prison incident."
Says it ALL! Thanks.
Okay, I have some questions. I have yet to hear anything substative about the part of this incident where Henry tried to establish that it was his house but couldnt.
What are the details is this regard?
Cuz quiet as its kept, if I saw someone prying open the door of a house in my neighborhood, I'm callin the po-lice too!
So it couldn't be both?
Cause from where I'm sitting, the for-proft prison system and the police departments that feed it seem to be targeting specific groups to provide fodder.
Poor, first and foremost, and after that minorities. Scracth that, the unwanted minorities like black and Latinos.
So, Professor Gates was arrested because we live in a police state and he happens to be the wrong color inside of that police state.
There is no doubt that this incident was proof of the ridiculous power that police officers wield. There is also no doubt that they tend to exert that power more frequently when dealing with minorities. Arguing anything requires ignoring the observable truth.
RJ
According to Gates and to the officer, he provided two forms of ID showing that the home was his.
He wasn't arrested for breaking into his home. He was arrested for speaking to the police in a manner they deems less than acceptable.
So, i support DV's attempt to change the dynamics of this discussion. Everyday I see or hear about people arrested and violated by the police based on similar circumstances, so it's a big problem.
However, the push to exclude race from the discussion makes no sense to me.
Big Man, you mean to say you haven't witnessed innumerable dash cam and cell cam videos of egregious police abuse of white men, white women, old men, old women, and just about anybody else unfortunate enough to have to deal with the popo on a day he rolled out the wrong side of his bed?!?!?!?!
Didn't DV have up a video of some old white woman getting the living isht tazed out of her just in the past few weeks?
Big Man, my understanding of the event is that he produced 2 forms of ID AFTER carrying on about being a black man in America and whatever other bs he was busy spouting off about because he was simply too arrogant to show the ID in the first place.
4 profit prison system is clearly the root, and to Big Man's point the two are not mutually exclusive. So yes DV, race is not the core issue. I certainly can't say Gates deserves to be labeled for this comment.
I'm still surprised to hear so many ppl defending po-po in MF'n Cambridge, Mass.
Unless he moved in to that house last wk, race is clearly a factor. How long has buddy been at Harvard? Come on yall...
Another point that makes race a factor is the fact that Gates would be recognizable by face throughout the police community if he was any other tenured professor at Harvard with half the media impressions of the likes of Gates.
You mean to tell me all the programs Gates has been involved in don't get media coverage in Cambridge? You mean to tell me all the accolades he has received since joining Harvard don't get ample coverage? Fact is the work he does has too much to do with "niche interestes" for non minorities to notice so men like Gates get phucked with just like pookie and nem.
Some additional background is Gates just returned from China and caught some kind of illness that he was struggling to shake. The door jams, he's got to go all the way to the back of the house to try to get in, then comes back to the front, law arrives, he's tired & irritable and he gets the pookie treatment.
"You didn't talk to me w/respect so you're coming with me." Man phuck the police. Bottom line.
KP
KP I was born and raised in Cambridge, MA, went from K-12 in the public school systems and grew up within walking distance to the area that the arrest took place and in my opinion, it is not a racist city. We do not have a police force that is any more racist than anywhere else. I know that's not really saying much, but it seems as though you're implying that we somehow have it worse and if so, I would disagree with that...
I'm not saying that race was definitely not a factor but it seems to me that from both versions of the stories, they were both behaving like jackasses... but only one of those jackasses had the power to make an arrest. This may sound naive/stupid, but I think Skip Gates is the one who made race an issue.
I'm not from boston. Been there a few times, visited harvard once. Heard several stories over the years about boston celtics (Dee Brown was one) and patriots having issues with race/discrimination etc. Sorry its not a large sample size. From what i recall it was primarily when it came to being shown properties in certain parts of town they clearly had units for sale when house hunting post trade/draft whatever. If you mean to tell me the boston area is not a hotbed for racial intolerance as a community, let alone the law enforcement, I'll take your word for it for now and wait for a few more first hand POVs.
I just think eliminating race is a stretch. Not the root but a stretch to eliminate it entirely.
KP
Cambridge is not in Boston. We're one of the most diverse cities and currently the only city in the country that has a black woman lesbian mayor. Prior to her we had a black gay male. These are our values. We're very different than Boston.
Dee Brown was in Wellesley. No one black lives in Wellesley.
Is Cambridge closer to Boston than Chelsea or Winthrop? How about Brookline or Somerville? Are you saying Cambridge wouldn't be considered part of the general metro area? I mean we're certainly not talking San Fran and LA here. Hell, I bet its not even Sacramento to San Fran. Or San Diego to LA.
If I can throw a rock and hit Boston, its boston. if my dog can get lost in the neighborhood and walk 10 miles down the frwy and end up in Boston, shyts boston.
I'm not trying to beat up your hometown by any means but I would venture to guess ppl in Cambridge go to Boston on the regular to "go to town" as old folk used to say or hit the hot spots cuz its not all that far.
I don't mind being wrong. If so I stand corrected.
KP
You can walk from Cambridge to Boston in 10 minutes but if you think that makes it Boston, you really don't get this area. Cambridge is REALLY close to Boston but they're still VERY different. Anyone from here can tell a Cambridge person from a Boston person in a matter of 10 seconds, it's not just about geography.
Chelsea is considered a part of Boston and Winthrop is further out, closer to the North Shore.
I'm not talking about the physical distance between Boston and Cambridge, they're connected by a bridge. I just mean that it's a totally different vibe. And yes we will go to Boston to go out but we do not like when people from Boston come to Cambridge for any reason.
"Well, look, obviously there was a tragedy in New York. I said at the time, without benefit of all the facts before me, that it looked like a possible case of excessive force. The judge has made his ruling, and we're a nation of laws, so we respect the verdict that came down."
--Presidential candidate Obama speaking on the Sean Bell police murder/police acquittals, April 2008
“Now, I don’t know, not having been there and not seeing all the facts, what role race played in that. But I think it’s fair to say, number one, any of us would be pretty angry; number two, that the Cambridge police acted stupidly in arresting somebody when there was already proof that they were in their own home; and, number three, what I think we know separate and apart from this incident is that there’s a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately. That’s just a fact."
--President Obama speaking on the arrest of his friend, Professor Henry Louis Gates
My on my it’s amazing how forthright politicians can be commenting on issues during non-election years. Would incumbent-candidate Barack Obama in 2012 have dared to describe the Cambridge police as “acting stupidly?” That’s most unlikely.
Maybe if Sean Bell had been a Harvard professor his murder would have at least been viewed within the context of racial profiling by Obama, as was the arrest of Skip Gates. I think class is as much of a factor, if not more of a factor, as race, driving the President’s moral outrage on this Gates issue.
Then again if Skip Gates had been Sean Bell, no one would even be discussing his arrest. The charges would not have been dropped, and he probably would have been found guilty of disorderly conduct.
Black men are convicted everyday in American for saying or doing nothing more than Skip Gates did.
During his recent trip to Ghana, the President declared: “In my country, African-Americans – including so many recent immigrants – have thrived in every sector of society.”
The President conveniently omitted any references to racial profiling during his speech in Africa, because that would have contradicted his propaganda objectives. Yes, some African Americans have thrived economically, yet despite that success any African American who has reached the top of his or her profession can be treated like common criminals due to racial profiling.
So, where is this issue on President Obama’s agenda? On the back-back-back burner sometime after 2012, or is it even on the stove plate?
DV,
You're right when you imply that the average white man shouldn't have to keeping getting fleeced in order to regulate and/or incarcerate black males, but this Gates affair is merely the manufactured reality of a radical autonomist. That Gates uses his "blackness" in order to run his hustle is self-evident. The problem with this "black" hustle is that it is now widely seen throughout our culture. The fact is that Gates is detached from the average black person and because he has chosen radical autonomy as a fundamental philosophy, he fills this void with an audience instead.
Pink sounds like Henry Adams parsing the differences between Quincy and Boston. Nonetheless,I appreciate the nuance. Still it doesn't invalidate the larger points about encroachment of the national security state and race as a factor influencing police response. Like Pink, so too did Prof. Gates minimize race even as he studied it.
"I studied the history of racism. I know every incident in the history of racism from slavery to Jim Crow segregation," Gates told The Washington Post on Tuesday in his first interview about the episode. "I haven't even come close to being arrested. I would have said it was impossible."
Instead, in a country where one in nine young black men are in prison, where racial profiling is still practiced, the arrest of a renowned scholar on a charge of disorderly conduct in front of his house last Thursday has fueled an ongoing debate about race in America in the age of its first black president.
This is why I think a black person can be an individual but must reject individualism. And in Gates's case if this is the stimulus which inspires him toward an engaged model of scholarship exemplified by John Henrik Clarke and W.E.B. DuBois then I think DV may be a bit too hard and premature in his judgment.
I'm not saying that racism doesn't exist, particularly in the criminal justice system. Incidents happen everyday that stem from police officers targeting young black males unnecessarily. But does that mean that every time a Black man is arrested, his arrest is an example of racism? Maybe I'm just biased because Skip Gates annoys me... But in my opinion his arrogance got him arrested, not necessarily his blackness.
pink is truth...,
Pink is right.
Gates obviously is upset because the Plantation Negro paradigm to which he subscribes has turned out to be a false god.
He had faith in his position as the Negro High Priest of Establishment Intellectualism. The Plantation drags negros like this out every time they need a few polysyllabic words from a non-threatening Negro to endorse whatever memes of the moment suit the aim of the day.
"Iz works in da beeg house! Iz cayn't beelieve dus!"
Well, I've known Skip since our Yale days going back to 1974 and I can guarantee you that he did not act in the manner the police report described. That's completely out of his character. Skip is one of the most easy going - too easy going for my taste - individuals I know. He is very careful with any racism charge. Again, too careful for my taste. So when he says that it was racism it likely was.
So when he says that it was racism it likely was.
Exactly "what" was racism?
Is "it" racism, whenever a black person feels "it" is racism?
Racism is a feeling isn't it?
Black people don't call you racist when you hate them. Black people call you racist when they hate you.
I've heard differing accounts about Skip's personality, so I don't now whether he's a laid back cat or not.
Dv
You have a point about what shook up Skip's world, and I actually made that point several times today. For a black man in America to have never contemplated the prospect of being racially profiled shows an amazing degree of separation from the concerns of most black folks. Hell, I think about it every time I get in the car, and have my entire routine down pat for how I will not allow the police to violate my rights, while also remaining relatively safe.
Cnulan
I agree that the police show out with white folks. That's why I said DV's larger point is appreciated and acknowledged. This is an authority thing, first and foremost.
However, you know, as do I, that folks apply their authority in different ways. You may have authority in you house, but you apply that authority differently when dealing with your wife than you do with your children. There is a certain level of respect afforded your wife that is not given to your children. At least that's how it works for me.
So, the police like to have authority over everybody, and they get angry when anyone challenges their authority. However, their response is often different depending on a person's race because on top of their conditioning as police officers, they have additional conditioning due to the social constructs of this country.
Anyway, I'm not as quick as DV to label folks who don't think like me as Plantation Negroes. Skip sounds like an elitist who was out of touch with the realities of black life because he had accrued so much cache in the white community that he thought he was immune to it. The white wife, the mixed children, the posh job and home, these are all things black folks try to acquire because many of us believe they will protect us.
Skip's arrest showed how stupid that idea truly is. Malcolm said it a long time ago, but some cats clearly forgot that they never stopped being niggers in some folks eyes.
Celtics Fan
Sorry homie, did you take a wrong turn somewhere?
Big Man, what DV, as he is - as usual - wont to do, left out is that Skip is quoted as saying the following in the same statement DV cited:
"Gates said he has gone out of his way in the past to avoid run-ins with police. When he first arrived at Harvard in 1991, he moved into a large house in the mostly white suburb of Lexington and promptly visited the police station to introduce himself.
'I wanted them to see my black face,' Gates said. 'I would be driving home late from Harvard. I had a Mercedes. I didn’t want to be stopped for ‘driving while black.’ . . . I should have done that with the Cambridge Police Department."
In other words, Skip was quite aware of racial profiling and was certainly not out of touch. Anyone who went to Harvard or Yale as a black person knows exactly what the dangers of being black in that "neighborhood" is.
I agree with DV. It may have started with a nosey neighbor looking out for Skip to my Lou's house, but it clearly is a typical story that ended as a display of power by insecure boys with pistols...
Race 1% cuz it's ever-present in America.
Power 99% cuz it's always present!
'Skip to my Lou'. LOL
What up 80? Welcome to the blog. I like your style.'
Celtics Fan. With a name like that. Whatever.
Big Man ... Big Man ... Where do we go wrong homie. You been gettin' down at DV.Net still repeating memes like "racial profiling" with a straight face.
Come on bra.
President Obama is like the driver who after running a redlight, slams his car into reverse attempting to correct the violation.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said that "the president did not regret his Wednesday remarks[regarding the arrest of Henry Louis Gates], but wanted to clarify that he was not calling the arresting officer stupid."
Gibbs told reporters that Obama felt that when it was clear that Harvard scholar Louis Gates Jr. was not a burglary suspect last week, "at that point, cooler heads on all sides should have prevailed."
Okay, so the officer is not a stupid person, he just lost his cool and acted stupidly.
The Prez is now shifting some of the responsibility to Dr. Gates. Does that mean that since Dr. Gates also lost his cool, he also acted stupidly?
Furthermore, didn't the Prez lose his cool, going off half-cocked without all of the facts. Then by his own definition the Prez also acted stupidly.
Damn, did Bush ever leave office?
What we have here is a circle of stupidity. If Dr. Gates had been smart enough to call to police for assistance to get into his home, none of this stupidity would have ever been exposed.
And there I was with my stupid self thinking that Obama was elected to restore America's image in the world.
Stupid America is as Stupid America does.
MF
"Skip was quite aware of racial profiling and was certainly not out of touch. Anyone who went to Harvard or Yale as a black person knows exactly what the dangers of being black in that "neighborhood" is."
I don't get why his freaking neighbor didn't realize it was Skip... dam ! did he just move in?
DV,
How does Gates draw such an audience for such abysmal entertainment? Aren't plantation Negroes those blacks that can't see that Gates is putting on a "black-centric" show and plantation Negroes are just the audience.
DV
I like your spot, it's a nice place to hang out.
But, if you think the police don't target blacks and latinos for stop, search and seizure more often than they do white folks, then you are the one who refuses to see.
Check this, white cats between the ages of 18-35 use more illegal narcotics than any other group in the country. Documented fact.
Yet, their arrest rates for simple possession charges are well below the arrest rates for black and latinos.
Why is that?
Becauase the popo picks and chooses where they want to do their "aggressive patrols" which are racial profiling with a different name.
It's real out here. I guess your nice suits and fly whips provide the same measure of protection that Skip assumed his fly crib and Harvard tenure gave him.
But, the cats I know, the ones just making it and what not, talk to me all the time about the way they regularly humilated and abused by police officers for no other crime but being black and male. It happens all day everyday, and cats are still dying behind it.
So yeah, I believe in racial profiling and I think it's a problem. You ain't said nothing yet that proves I'm wrong.
"DV,
How does Gates draw such an audience for such abysmal entertainment?" TD
To which entertainment do you refer? His writings or the media frenzy around this incident?
"Aren't plantation Negroes those blacks that can't see that Gates is putting on a "black-centric" show and plantation Negroes are just the audience."
That's part of it. The other part is the Plantation Crackas who are subconsciously pacified by the delusion that white skin makes them immune to the same transgressions of a police state.
If any of the 24 white men and Jewish Rabbis arrested in New Jersey yesterday on money laundering and corruption charges, were to turn to the cameras and scream "It's Because I'm A White Man In America!"
or
"It's Because I'm A Jew In America" there would be an entire different media frenzy and collective national perception about the value of race -
Did Barack Obama win the presidency BECAUSE he was a black man in America?
Then 'how come' Skip was arrested BECAUSE he is a black man in America?
Did Barack Obama win the presidency BECAUSE he was a black man in America?
Then 'how come' Skip was arrested BECAUSE he is a black man in America?
You really believe this made sense?
That because Obama's blackness helped propel him to the white House, that the blackness of Skip Gates could not have contributed to his arrest?
That's wild if you believe that, it's really wild. That is incredibly twisted logic that ignores a score of nuances.
I'm going to say this. Throughout the history of this country up until the present day, the accomplishments of some black folks have often been used to hide the abuse of others.
To say that the success of Barack Obama makes young brothers immune to humilation and abuse at the hands of the police because of their skin color is to be willfully blind to the realities of life in this country. It's crazy.
This selective all or nothing mindset is troubling.
Big Man.
You lost me.
You making one of those points only you and Conservative Feedback understand.
Big Man ... Big Man ... Where do we go wrong homie. You been gettin' down at DV.Net still repeating memes like "racial profiling" with a straight face.
Dude, the person you call God’s Son is repeating memes like "racial profiling" with a straight face.
“What I think we know separate and apart from this incident is that there is a long history in this country of African Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately. That's just a fact.
As you know, Lynn, when I was in the state legislature in Illinois, we worked on a racial profiling bill because there was indisputable evidence that blacks and Hispanics were being stopped disproportionately. And that is a sign, an example of how, you know, race remains a factor in this society. That doesn't lessen the incredible progress that has been made. I am standing here as testimony to the progress that's been made.
And yet the fact of the matter is, is that this still haunts us. And even when there are honest misunderstandings, the fact that blacks and Hispanics are picked up more frequently and often time for no cause casts suspicion even when there is good cause. And that's why I think the more that we're working with local law enforcement to improve policing techniques so that we're eliminating potential bias, the safer everybody
is going to be.” President Obama
Whatcha gotta say bout dat Plato?
Nah, DV, you understond my argument just fine.
Your statement was based on a logical fallacy, and it was an obvious logical fallacy.
Barack Obama being elected president because of hi.s blackness has nothing to do with the claims of Gates. Yet you made that assertion because it sounded fly.
It's cool, though. It wasn't the first time, it won't be the last
Bottom line, I think this was a well timed trap designed to confound the public and disrupt the growing public support for a government healthcare option.
Only people w/o cerebral balance get trapped by emotional issues.
The Prez acted stupidly, and now he's backtracking.
Bottom line, I think this was a well timed trap designed to confound the public and disrupt the growing public support for a government healthcare option.
rotflmbao...., whew!!!!
that was a well-turned nugget of pure comedy gold.
I mean the question posed at the conference not the incident itself.
Can I throw in my two cents as a southern red headed white chick raised amongst scary pink skinned blue eyed rednecks? I live in the very diverse city of Oakland California. Did it ever occur to people that cops, no matter their own race, are just power hungry thick necked undereducated doughboys? Overweight bodybuilders who don't look human anymore? They aren't workaday normal people; they are in large part bullies. Hero wannabes. Personality disorders galore. And they are in large part rude and impossible to communicate with, lousy listeners, just bullies. I'm an attractive enough white chick and every experience I've ever had with a cop has been scary. You aren't allowed to be human and argue, you have to roll over, no matter your race. It's like dealing with control freaks with personality disorders. Gates was right, I'm right, everybody on this page is right. We've bred several generations of obese testosterone freaks into cops, and it's no wonder. It's just no wonder.
miss C in the hizzy....,
Black men in America need to use their commonsense. A neighbor said she saw two black men trying to break in Gates home. She called the police. The police responded. Once inside, Gates should have explained what occured and left it at that. He and the cabdriver used their shoulders to push open the door or whatever. The police officer was prudent to ask for identification. Now, Gates claimed her showed the officer two forms of ID. The officer said that Gates just showed him his Harvard ID--not his driver's license. And from this point on--the battle takes place. A black folks we cannot elevate stupidity to a major cause and that's what happened here: How is a professor who wears a Herman The Monster shoe and walks with a cane supposed to get into a debate (which could turn physical) inside your home (with no witnesses on your side)? Does that sound intelligent? Now, If Gates wanted to act as if he was Shaft, then by all means go out in a blaze of glory. However, we saw the President of the United States retract his statement after an organized group of police officer held a press conference decrying what the president had to say. This suggests to me that an organized group(in this case: police officers) have a tactical advantage over one Super Negro (with no in-group backup). Notice, I have not seen any of the major civil rights leaders hold a press conference or those up-to-date Rap Brown revolutaries say a damn word indicating that they have Gates' back. Gates and Ogletree were left out there on their own. Now, if Black folks who have access to the PRESIDENT, mind you, can't back up a few police officers (who probably know who Eddie Murphy is as opposed to Gates), where does that leave the rest of us laboring out here in so-called police state America--huh? If black folks felt srongly about this issue, well, the White House phone would be ringing off the hook and they would organize to bring out change; but, alas, black folks are what you call just-like-in-the-movies folks who, when all is said and done, are not organized to bring about change. Case closed.
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