Soap Dropping and Other Tasteless Jokes

Ever read the comments after a news story about rape or child abuse?

Without fail, you'll see some variation of the common joke about the dangers of dropping the soap in prison. You'll typically find quite a few people cheering the fact that the convicted suspect will now face years of sexual abuse. You might even find some people going into graphic detail about what they'd like to do the person if they were in jail.

And you'll rarely find anybody objecting.

Well, hopefully this story will make you reconsider your reluctance to not objecting? Those of you who click the link will find a Washington Post editorial reaming out the Justice Department for dragging its feet on addressing prison rape involving adults and rape involving juveniles. The editorial also provides links to reports about exactly what's happening in our prisons.

I admit that I used to make the jokes about prison rape. Hell, I'm still not totally immune to hoping that someone is abused in prison as payback for the heinous nature of their offenses. However, in recent years I've examined my attitude on prison rape and I realized I was dead wrong. There is nothing funny about people being sexually abused while in prison and there is no true justice in vigilante justice. No matter how heinous a person's crime, they deserve to be afforded all the rights that every other prisoner is supposed to be afforded. We as a nation will not be judged by how we treat our model inmates, but by how we treat those inmates who are truly scum.

It reminds me of this blog I wrote a while back where I ranted about the way people dehumanize others when they become angry at them. In that blog I talked about how it's a slippery slope when we try to remove someone's humanity. Before long, we'll be justifying anything if we can just convince ourselves that the person being brutalized isn't really human.

Personally, I feel like we as a society dehumanize anyone who enters our prisons. We are willing to turn a blind eye to abuse in prison because we've already decided that those people aren't really part of the human race while they're locked up. As long as they're inmates, they might as well be animals in a zoo. We know their lives probably suck, but we don't think it's our jobs to fix it.

That's why so many of us are so comfortable joking about their rape. In no other situation but prison is rape considered a positive thing, or a deserved reward. None of us would be so cavalier about the rape of non-inmates regardless of how evil or horrible they are as humans. Yet, once somebody is officially convicted of a crime, their rape becomes so unimportant that even if they are a child the Justice Department has to do a cost-benefit analysis to determine whether they want to correct the problem! And that's for children, they aren't even talking about adults.

That's unacceptable. It's ridiculous, it's callous and it sickens me. It should sicken you too.

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This Right Here...

There was a time when I automatically thought the police were the good guys.

I guess it was probably back in elementary school. You know, sitting in D.A.R.E. class, singing the cool anti-drug song, competing for cheap prizes; the police seemed cool back then. Cool guns, cool uniforms, just all around cool.

It's funny how things change as you get older.

The police went from protectors to predators as I aged. Maybe that's not the case for everybody, but it's true for me and far too many other people. Our fantasies of Officer Friendly tend to fade into the ether shortly after we realize that no fat white man delivers gifts in the 'hood.

I was thinking about the police and their role in our society recently after I read this article about some truly heinous police behavior in Pennsylvania. The story talks about the corruption and abuse that reigned in one small town police department, and how it ultimately may have cost one man his life. It's a chilling story.

Chilling, but, sadly, not surprising.

Protect and serve is a lie that sounds true. Seriously, how many of us truly believe that the police are here to protect and serve our interests? I'm not saying they don't protect and serve somebody, but I don't think it's me and you. At least not most of us. I think the police were created to protect the interests of the wealthy, and while they may at times protect the poor, working and middle classes, their ultimate job remains the same. Protect those with the most to lose.

When you examine things from that angle, it all makes sense. It makes sense why the police so frequently profile certain communities, it makes sense that they selectively enforce certain laws. It's not about service or true protection. It's about establishing a protection racket where all of us pay for pseudo-protection from an armed group that closely resembles the thugs they are supposed to be battling. A group given the right to make split second decisions about life and death by the same people who they may kill.

The entire system is built on trust and ignorance. I guess you could call it ignorant trust. Most of us are ignorant about how police departments do their jobs, and thus we are operating on blind trust that they will do what's best for all of us. And this is despite all of the evidence to the contrary.

What happened in that small Pennsylvania town may sound heinous and somewhat unbelievable, but really it's not that different from what happens all over this country everyday. Too often police officers are rapists, murderers, liars, thieves and worse.

Even those that are "honest" still have serious issues. Many of them have warped and twisted the law all while justifying their behavior by telling us it's what keeps us safe. And like sheep, we allow ourselves to be herded towards a future where the group with the guns will rule completely over those of us who are unarmed.

That right there pisses me off, and it worries me. The whole operation troubles me, just as any situation with an obvious imbalance of power concerns me. I can see which direction this enterprise is tilting towards, and it's not pretty.

It's not pretty for any of us.





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This Again

Death is a constant.

One of the preachers at my church likes to remind the congregation that ever minute you're living, you're also dying. Every day brings us closer to our last breath, and none of us know when that last breath is coming.

I'm reminded of that constantly.

I see death all the time at my job. It's just a part of the fabric of what I do. I see the mangled bodies, I see the bloodstains and I see the families left behind to cope. Typically, I see the broken, black families left behind to cope.

Emphasis on the word black.

I believe that far too much focus is placed on black pathology in the media. However, that doesn't mean that I'm blind to the fact that black communities, particularly working class and poor black communities, have some real issues.

As one lady told me recently, "It's a war zone out here."

I hate harping on the violence. I'm sure most of y'all are tired of hearing about it. But the violence won't leave us alone. It's a parasite, gradually getting bloated on the underbelly of our communities. Eventually, like many parasites, it's going to kill the host.

It's time for a purge.

I watched this mother cry about her children. I watched her wonder what more she could have done. I watched her tears, and I felt the pain coming off of her body in waves. And I was powerless to help.

It's a terrible feeling y'all. Just a terrible feeling.

Pain should be personal. But, when your children are gunned down in the street, your pain become public. Your horror is part of the spectacle. How do we amplify and disseminate that pain to the masses to make them understand that something has to happen? That it's going to take the entire village of the United States of the America to heal what ails our youth. How do we do it?

Anybody know?





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Oh, The Horror!

Was watching CNN on Thursday.

This dude Jack, don't know his last name, was ranting about that gang rape in Cali. (Which reminds me. Does anybody know when it became cool for anchors to stop being objective? Rick Sanchez is freaking ridiculous. I was just wondering.) You know the incident where a 15-year old girl was raped by nearly a dozen men.

Anyway, Jack was pissed because according to police, folks stood by and watched the girl get raped, and some might have even joined in. Jack tied the actions of bystanders in this case to the failure of witnesses to come forward in the Derrion Albert beating incident in Chicago. He then wondered when we became a nation that watched while people were raped and beaten.

Hmm....

Might I refer CNN to the Lynching era and Civil Rights Era of American history.

From my vantage point, Americans have been pretty good at ignoring rapes and beatings for some time, especially when those rapes and beatings involved black folks getting brutalized by white folks.

For centuries, black people were severely mistreated and abused by a portion of the white population, while the majority stood on the sidelines and said "Not my concern."

See, while I believe racism was pervasive in the past, I understand that its most brutal aspects weren't things discussed out in the open. That's why the Klan and other domestic terrorism organization handled much of their business at night, and why they liked to wear disguises. That allowed the general public to pretend they didn't know what was going on, or who was responsible.

But, they did.

They saw the people of this country being mistreated and they turned their heads. They watched women being beaten and raped, men being castrated and lynched and sometimes they even cheered. They cheered and had picnics.

I think what happened to that young girl is horrible. I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy. But, as I've said before, this rush to pretend that what's happening today has no parallel in history is ridiculous. Humans have been the same savage creatures since we were created.

This ain't nothing new.



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Meh.....

In a follow up to yesterday's post about the never-ending cycle of stories about the way the police treat minorities, particularly black folks, I thought I'd talk about how minorities within the police department often are treated.

I've seen several recent stories, including one out of Philly and this one out of Los Angeles where minority officers have complained of racism and discrimination within the department. In addition, I've had the pleasure of hearing some of these complaints firsthand in my regular life.

It seems that many minorities are denied opportunities for advancement, are subjected to bigotry and are generally treated like second class citizens within police departments. Apparently there are police officesr and then there are minority police officers. They are not all on the same team, all of the time.

I just have one thing to say about that...

Meh.

Y'all know I like to call out racism and I think it's an important task. But, when I hear about minority officers getting shafted by white folks, I can't really work up too much outrage. My reasoning is simple. If you lie down with dogs, you get up with fleas...

What do I mean? Well, I wouldn't be so stupid as to claim that ALL police officers are evil. However, from what I've seen and heard, becoming a police officer seems to imbue folks with a certain sense of superiority that does not respond well to being challenged. Yesterday's story about Professor Gates was a prime example of that, but I've seen it on multiple occasions in my regular life. Many police officers expect everyone to obey them immediately and to meekly submit to having their rights violated. Period.

Minorities who join police departments have this same attitude. More importantly, they often tend to apply racist standards to other minorities who are not a part of Big Blue. To a certain degree, being a police officer overrides all other considerations of race and class, that is until minority officers are forced to confront their own subordinate status within the hierarchy of Big Blue.

I find it ludicrous that the same folks who turn a blind eye to racial profiling and other abuses would expect the general public to be outraged when their rights are violated. In the story I linked to, the Asian officer bringing the lawsuit worked in the narcotics unit. If there is one thing I know, it's that officers in those units bend or break rules all the damn time, and have no problem violating the civil rights of "bad guys" to make an arrest. Yet, this officer has the nerve to be upset that the same folks he regularly allowed to mistreat others would turn around and mistreat him?

That's just stupid.

I don't have sympathy for folks who are wronged if they've consistently wronged others, or watched while others have been wronged. I don't feel bad when minority police officers are mistreated because they knew the organization was rotten in so many ways, but they allowed it to continue to discriminate against other minorities, particularly young black males, unabated. They are complicit in every act of wrongdoing, and any abuse they suffer at the hands of their fellow officers is likely deserved.

I don't care.


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Banks Too?

Can't a brother go anywhere without having to see the barrel of a gun?

It's bad enough that I'm in danger when I'm driving, or at the club, or walking down the street. But, it turns out I can't even go to the bank to handle my financial business without coming face to face with the business end of a police officer's service weapon.

Check out this story for more details on what's got me miffed.

As you can see, what we have here is another example of the dangers of being black in a public place. These two cats went to the bank to do some business, were deemed a threat, and came face to face with machine guns. Just a regular day at the office for a black man.

If I wanted to have a blog solely dedicated to chronicling cases of mistaken identity and racial profiling for black folks, it wouldn't be that hard. Everyday black people somewhere are reminded that they are deemed a threat simply because of the color of their skin.

It's an interesting tightrope black folks walk. We have to make decisions about our clothes, our cars, even our names, with one eye on the stereotypes associated with being black. It's not enough for us to strive to be comfortable and happy in our own skins because our skin is often the problem. Sure, everybody worries about their image, but it seems like black folks have a special cross to bear.

Some of y'all may have heard about the recent controversy regarding two of the characters in the Transformers movie. From what I can gather, the two characters embody all of the popular stereotypes about black "gangstas." The thing is, when some folks pointed out these problems to director Michael Bay, he basically said "This is the way things really are. We're just trying to do something that's real."

I see that mindset a lot. People justify the use of stereotypes by claiming that they are only being "real." They say if black folks don't want to be labeled as criminals, they should stop committing crimes. They say if we don't want to be considered freeloaders, we need to get off welfare. Everybody wants to shift the blame for their actions to someone else.

I'm tired of it. I'm tired of people refusing to stand up and be accountable for their own lives and choices. I'm tried of people thinking that stereotypes are acceptable if they're "funny" or based in some truth. I'm tired of people failing to see the forest because they are focused on the one pine tree in their paths.

There is a price to pay for racial profiling. Everyday, black people in this country pay that price. We pay with our time, our dignity and, sometimes, our lives.

I'm tired of paying.



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A Departure

Update. Please check out this story as a companion piece to the blog as well.



I was pecking out my next piece on the six agents of corruption when I stumbled across this piece and decided it was time for a brief departure.

If y'all click on the link, it will go to a story about another white woman who got herself into a jam and used an age-old trick to free herself. Can anybody guess what it was?

That's right, Blame a Nigger.

For the few folks unfamiliar with this trick, it involves any white person, but typically a woman, needing a quick explanation for some problem in their lives, and deciding to blame some random black people, usually men. This trick is used to escape prosecution for crimes, to distract from infidelity, it's pretty much the go-to move for any unscrupulous white person in trouble.

In this case, a white woman who lived in the Philadelphia suburbs had apparently been stealing money from folks at her job, and decided she needed to make a quick getaway with her daughter. To cover her tracks, she called police with a phony story about getting in a car accident with some random black men in a Cadddy, (nice tough), who abducted her and her young daughter.

Of course, this caused a major crapstorm. After all, nothing sparks police action like missing white women, and this case had the perfect convergence of white women in trouble and hypothetical "ghetto niggers" causing problems. I'm sure more than one cop creamed his pants when this call came out, and quite a few black men had their civil rights violated along the way.

Ahhh, America.

Anyway, when everything had died down, it was discovered this was just another case of Blame a Nigger, and now everybody is kicking themselves for falling for it again. This would be heartening, if I didn't know for a fact that no amount of self flagellation is going to prevent the next incident of Blame a Nigger.

It doesn't matter how often black folks and like-minded white folks remind everybody else that it's not ok to stereotype black males as criminals, it's still going to happen. Sadly, I really doubt that we will ever erase centuries of conditioning.

Black men are the de-facto bad guys. We get stopped more often, we get searched more often and we are more likely to be the victims of police brutality. These are facts. This reality is possible because many folks, in their heart of hearts, see a black face when they picture somebody harming them. It's unfortunate, but it's real.

So, what can we as black people do?

First, we must learn to protect young black men who are not involved in criminal activity from becoming victims of Blame a Nigger. We must instruct them in their civil rights, we must teach them how to interact with police to minimize the likelihood of a violent incident.

We have to forcefully push back against the negative stereotypes pushed by the media and others, even if that seems like a futile fight. Finally, we're going to have to pray.

Lord knows, we need those prayers.


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This Ain't Normal

In my city, it's pretty normal for a black male to die from a gunshot wound in a crime-ridden neighborhood because of his involvement with narcotics trafficking.

I suspect that's pretty normal all across this country. Drug dealers die or go to jail everyday and most of the time it's not news. No need for long-involved profiles on how they ended up in a life of crime, no attempts to explain how their lives still had value. They are just dead, and nobody bats an eye.

But, let some white guys rob some banks, and it's a different story.

If you take the time to read that story, you'll find a detailed recounting of white cats in financial trouble robbing folks. And I mean robbing, not embezzling, not cooking the books, but pulling out a hammer and telling cats to "give it up."

It's to be expected that during tough economic times (TET) folks are going to start robbing. If you ain't got something, and something else does, some cats believe that's a good reason to play Jesse James. Shoot, in my city every day brings more reports of robberies and car jackings. I'm sure it's the same in most cities across the country.

The thing is, when these robberies feature young black males, nobody seems to care why they are robbing folks.

Feel free to correct if you disagree, but I can honestly say that I don't remember the last time I read a news article detailing why young black males are involved in the drug trade or the robbing trade. I really have not read an article that strikes the same tone of sympathy, and goes out of its way to blame the actions of the criminals on the circumstances of their lives.

Cause, if we're comparing effed up life circumstances, well young black men in the the inner city just have to win, hands down. It's not even a contest. It's like PacMan versus Hatton.

This story, and the many others like it I've read, are just another example of how this country defines "normal" through the prism of "whiteness."

Y'all think I'm tripping, well let me break it down further.

Black people are expected to be violent, amoral, and predatory. It's assumed to be in our DNA. Therefore, when we commit crimes, such as robbery, we are not responding to our environments or stress in our lives, we are instead staying in line with our deepest instincts. Having sympathy for a black criminal is akin to having sympathy for a hungry tiger. The best way to deal with both is a high-powered rifle.

Conversely, white people represent all that is good, pure and perfect in the world. When they fail to live up to their innate goodness, it is because of outstanding stress placed on their lives. Therefore whenever white people succumb to this stress and commit crimes, we must be reminded of exactly what stress was in their lives so no other white people would believe that the problem was innate.

Do y'all get it now?

Nobody wrote articles talking about how difficult it is to make an honest living in the hood because nobody cares about that. After all, even you gave black folks jobs, they'd still do evil because it's in their blood. Instead, we should devote our time to solving the problems affecting the lives of white people so they can get back to their normal, angelic lives.

Anything else is not only a waste of time...

It just ain't normal.



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Game Done Changed

When I was a little kid, there was a simple rule that governed fights at school.

Always get the other guy to swing first.

Kid logic dictated that if you enticed the other guy to throw the first punch, you couldn't be held liable for what happened after that. This meant engaging in complicated rituals that involved walking around and around in a circle, shoulder to shoulder, daring the other kid to swing first. Sometimes, unruly bystanders might grab one participant's hand and make him hit the other guy just to get the fight started.

Unfortunately, most teachers and school administrators didn't agree with our rock solid kid logic. Invariably, they would punish both students and turn a deaf ear to our pleas about who started the brawl. Sometimes, not being the aggressor would win brownie points with parents, but there was no guarantee.

I thought about kid logic and adult logic when I read this piece which was linked to at the Angry Asian Man blog.

Seems that a Korean student in Canada was handling his business in some game called "speedball" when one of his pale classmates decided he didn't appreciate his prowess and called him an "effing Chinese." The Korean student let homeboy know that racial slurs aren't good business, and the white dude decided to haul off and punch him in the mouth.

And that's where the story gets interesting. See, the Korean student is actually a black belt in a martial arts discipline. However, instead of unleashing the full fury of his fists, he only gives the white cat one good shot to the nose with his weaker hand. And he breaks the cat's nose.

Now, school officials not only suspended both students, but the police actually arrested the Korean student and some folks are talking about kicking him out of school permanently. There was recently a community march to support what he did, and complain about bullying, but school officials are still taking a hard line stance.

What's really good?

I mean, this seems pretty clear cut to me. The kids got in a fight. One kid started the fight by being racist, and by being a bully. Unfortunately for him, he picked on a kid who actually knew how to defend himself, and who had no problems beating his butt. The End.

Part of me doesn't think the Korean kid should even get suspended. Sure, he was fighting, but when somebody is throwing around slurs and punches, I think fighting is warranted. I know officials want you to run and find a teacher, but that ain't realistic in my opinion. In real life, becoming a snitch will only make your problems worse, and taking the strictly non-violent approach is guaranteed to get you future beatings from bullies. Your best bet is to attempt to diffuse the situation, and then use the bare minimum of force if that doesn't work.

It sounds like that's exactly what the Korean teenager did in this instance, and yet he's the one being punished excessively. This is mindboggling, yet not truly surprising. After all, what this story really boils down to is what happens when minorities respond to racism outside of the "accepted" channels.

During the Civil Rights era, 60 minutes journalist Mike Wallace did a piece on the Nation of Islam called "The Hate that Hate produced." It was an inside look at the black nationalist, religious group that focused primarily on their views about white people being devils, and their paramilitary leanings. The piece catapulted Malcolm X into the national consciousness and forever framed the NOI.

I've often wondered why 60 minutes spent so much time on the response to hate, but nowhere near that much time on the actual hate itself? I mean, there was no show dedicated to the violence the KKK and other domestic terrorist organizations were inflicting on black people at the time. There was no in-depth study of how racism affected housing, education and quality of life. Nope, hatred only became news when black folks started arming themselves and clearly outlining the source of their misery. 2520s.

That seems pretty analogous to the situation with this Canadian teenager. The racism isn't the the school's concern, the violence because of racism wasn't their initial concern either. Instead, the big problem is the fact that this Asian kid had the audacity to strike back, and strike back so forcefully, that there can be no doubt of his ability to protect his interests.

I guess that's a game changer.







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Because I'm Me and You're You

A recent rash of shootings involving police officers and black men has sparked a lot of discussion and led to some very familiar questions:

Would there be fewer police shootings if police departments more adequately reflected the makeup of the communities officers patrol?

Can black men ever be safe in America when our default position is that of an imminent threat?

Why are police officers given the benefit of the doubt whenever they commit a violent act involving black people?

Those are all worthy, valid and important questions. Unfortunately, those questions haven't been asked enough by the general public or by the mainstream media charged with informing the public. Instead, another question has been asked way too often:

Why is it such a big deal when the police shoot a black man, but it's not a big deal when black people shoot each other?

I live in New Orleans. Black on black crime, particularly murder is as common here as red beans and rice on Mondays. Just about every single day in this city brings the news of another young black man gunned down in the streets like a rabid dog. Rarely do these shootings involve the police. Most often, they involve other black men involved in some way in the narcotics business, and often they go unsolved. The public is upset by this reality, we complain about it, but it rarely leads to riots.

Those are the bleak but accurate facts.

What I'm still trying to figure out is what those facts have to do with the fact that unarmed black men are killed disproportionately by police officers.

Do any of y'all know?

In my mind, those are two separate and important issues. The fact that young black men are killing each other at an alarming rate has very little to do with the fact that the police are killing young black men at an alarming rate. Logically, those two things are not related. Both issues are worthy of attention, but that does not mean that the two issues are connected.

So why do people keep bringing up one issue when I want to discuss the other?

Well, we all know why this happens. It happens because self-serving white people and idiotic black people love to point out examples of black pathology whenever they are confronted with the pathology other groups display towards black folks. It's as if people really believe that because black people have their own internal problems we have no right to complain when other people fuck us over.

It's like telling a rape victim she really shouldn't have been wearing that miniskirt and walking alone on the street.

Police officers are not supposed to be common criminals. They have privileges and rights that common criminals do not have. Police officers demand a level of respect and wield a level of authority that common criminals do not possess.

So, why would anybody expect the public to react the same way to a shooting involving police officers and a shooting involving common criminals?

It is pure hypocrisy for police officers to regularly embrace the benefits of being part of a special class, and then shirk the responsibilities that come with that status when things get rough. That's not the way life works.

You dance with the girl you brought to the prom. You live with side effects of the job you chose. Life is about living with the consequences of our choices, and one of the consequences of being a police officer is that you are held to a higher standard when you shoot someone.

Because you're you and I'm me.


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A Tale of Two Americas

This is a familiar story.

You've all heard it many times. Some of the main characters change, but the ending is almost always the same. Since I'm sure most of y'all are familiar with the tale, you won't mind if I spill the beans on the ending.

Niggers get fucked.


Tale number one begins slightly less than a year ago, when Joe Horn saw some damned illegal immigrants breaking into his neighbor's home. Horn, being the good, hard-working American that he is, jumped on the phone and dialed 911 to notify the authorities of what was happening.

Unfortunately, Horn wasn't pleased with the possibility that these foreigners might be able to get away with their crime before the police could arrive to catch them. So he told a 911 dispatcher that he was going to go outside and kill them.

That's right, for stealing a television, their punishment was to be death by shotgun. I wonder what the Indians think about that? Anyway, the stalwart Mr. Horn charged out to his front yard, after loading up his trusty shotgun, and took two lives with two shots.

Bang, bang, they're dead.

For his trouble, Mr. Horn became both a national hero and villain. He was vilified by those who dislike vigilante murder, and lauded by those who think the damn spics are taking over the country. Eventually, a jury of Mr. Horn's peers found him not guilty of all charges.


Tale two does not end so swimmingly.

John White lives in a suburb with a lot of white people. His son is friends with the children of these white people. One day, his son attended a party where said children began to threaten him with violence. It seems that one of the female white children believed that Mr. White's son had written some disparaging comments about her on a social networking website (allegedly threatening to rape her) and called upon her male white counterparts to defend her honor.

Unfortunately for Mr. White's son, he did not write those comments, someone else posing as him did. This did not stop said white youths from menacing him to the point that he felt the need to leave the party and return home to his father and his father's guns.

However, the white youths, imbued with a sense of courage and power thanks to alcohol and drugs, decided they were going to drive to Mr. White's house and exact their revenge on his son. They were even so gracious as to phone ahead and tell Mr. White's son what was going to happen. The boy, being of somewhat sound mind, notified his father of the impending visit. Mr. White armed himself with a weapon.

When the white youths arrived on Mr. White's front yard, they commenced to yell racial epithets at he and his son to display their anger. Mr. White brandished a gun at one of the youths, that youth reacted in a belittling manner. Mr. White shot and killed him. Mr. White was convicted of second-degree manslaughter and is awaiting sentencing.

The case stirred up a ton of racial animosity within the New York suburb where Mr. White lived, as he sought to classify the youths as a young lynch mob, and their supporters cast them as misguided teens looking to defend a young white maiden's honor.

So ends tale two.

This is my tale of two Americas. I know which one I live in, do you?

I Complain A Lot

I really do.

In fact, looking back over my posts on this blog, I found that roughly 95 percent of them have some sort of complaint about the way the world works at their core. Complaining is cool, but I realized that I don't offer a bunch of solutions, which makes my complaining seem a lot like whining.

Anyway, I was strolling through the blogsphere and touched down for a minute at Nat Turner's Revenge. While perusing the brother's site, I came across a post he did about one of my favorite topics, HBO's The Wire.

I'll save my gushing explanation of the show for another time, since those of you who have read this blog for a while have heard it all before. Instead, I want to talk about one of the issues raised in the post about the show.

One of the main elements of The Wire is the futility of the War on Drugs and the impact that war has had on low-income people, particularly black folks. Anyway, the creators of the show did a piece for Time Magazine where they discussed one of their solutions for dealing with the War on Drugs and it was a doozy. You can check out the short article here.

As you can see, the authors advocate that anybody sitting on a jury that is considering a case involving drug violations vote for acquittal regardless of the guilt or innocence of the accused. They point out that jury nullification is an acceptable protest for citizens to engage in, particularly if the want change. The show's creators said that this strategy shouldn't be used if violence is involved in the case, but is justified if it is strictly a drug case.

Now that is interesting.

Before I even discuss the merits of this strategy, I would like to point out that it's kind of ironic that the show's creators advocate for it because in The Wire's final season one of the most loathsome characters on the show avoided prosecution through jury nullification.

State Senator Clay Davis, a snake who had his hands in more pockets than a Calcutta thief, managed to avoid conviction on accusations that he misused public funds by convincing a black jury that his prosecution was a result of rich, white folks looking to give him the shaft. Despite the mountain of evidence against Davis, the jury decided that racism was a bigger deal, and let him walk. The response by several characters, whose dialogue was of course okayed by the show's creators, expressed their disgust with the outcome and the jurors. So, it would seem that the show's creators only support jury nullification when it's used for issues they agree with it.

But, I digress.

The idea of using your position on a jury to write historical wrongs is one I've thought about on many occasions. I've never sat on a jury, but I've often wondered how I would comport myself if given that opportunity. I don't know if I would be able to sentence another black man to the hell that is prison, even if I think they are guilty of a heinous crime. I know for certain I would never be able to convict someone of a crime that could result in their death.

However, I don't believe that every juror should refuse to convict criminals on drug convictions simply to prove a point. On one hand, it would definitely send a message to the government that there needs to be a change in how law enforcement and the judicial system handle the drug problem. On the other hand, if criminals, (and despite the wrong done to them, these people are criminals) are allowed to operate without fear of consequences, I don't see things getting any better for folks in the hood.

The judicial system may be corrupt and unjust, but there is no denying that it is a deterrent.

I would rather see people focus their protests and complaints on impacting those areas where real change can be made to the system, instead of nullifying juries. I know the creators of The Wire have no faith in "systems," but I don't see how the world can work without certain systems. I think we as a nation need to figure out a way to force the government to spend more money on items like education, infrastructure and public services instead of just agreeing to let crack dealers walk.

But, while that sounds like a good solution, it's still pretty vague. In concrete terms, I think we need to advocate to change the funding mechanism for local school systems, that we need to do away with mandatory minimum drug sentences and that we need to make an immediate investment into job training and educational services for prisoners.

Schools should not be funded based on the affluence or lack of affluence of the local tax base. We need to have one big pot that allocates the same amounts to every student and also pays for capital improvements based on a priority system as opposed to a patronage system.

As I've said before, mandatory minimums are unjustly enforced and unfairly remove decision making from judges. There is no justification for the gap between the sentences for crack cocaine and powder cocaine, but, more importantly, it makes no sense to automatically sentence people to a decade in prison without considering the actual circumstances of their crime.

Finally, the way we treat prisoners in this country is atrocious. If we want prisoners to be positive, contributing members of society we have to spend money on helping them achieve those goals. We cannot warehouse them in cesspools that encourage recidivism much more than rehabilitation. Everyone understands that most prisoners lack education and job skills, let's rectify that problem to make them productive again.

I think that if more Americans rally around these three goals we can see immediate changes in our country, changes for the better. Otherwise we're doomed to fight the same drug war over and over, with our only recourse being to punish offenders harshly or let them free to commit more crimes.