EDITORIAL

A time to consider hard truths

Posted

There are those who suggest our nation’s shameful legacy of racism and discrimination has been completely mitigated, and even absolved, by the undeniable progress we have made toward equality, especially that seen over the last five decades.

There are those who assert the recent wave of protests – at times, unfortunately, violent in nature – over highly-publicized instances of black men dying at the hands of law enforcement represent the endgame of those who foster unrest and mistrust to further their personal or political ambitions. There are those, too, who wrongly hold up the misdeeds of some police offices as a blanket indictment of the entire profession.

There are those who, however well intentioned, willfully ignore what this recent string of incidents represents and what the current climate says about where we are as a society – and where we need to go. There are those would turn an opportunity for reflection, discourse and understanding into another adversarial, corrosive chapter in a history that already has far too many.

Baltimore, most recently, has captivated the nation’s attention, with the turmoil having been sparked by the death of Freddie Gray a week after his arrest last month. The details of the case – as with the Trayvon Martin case in Florida, the killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo. and many others – are familiar to most, even as the particulars are heatedly parsed in all corners of the public arena.

Last week, after an eruption of violence, Baltimore City State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby announced charges against six officers in connection with Gray’s death. One of them stands accused of the most serious charge, “second-degree depraved heart murder” – the name of which implies indifference to human life. The Baltimore police union has stood by its officers and questioned the motivations of the state’s attorney. For now, at least, the violence has subsided.

We would not presume to know what was in the heart of the officer in question, or in those of his colleagues. Nor would we, as distant observers, attempt to make a definitive judgment based on the facts of the case. Those tasks are rightly left to judges and juries.

Our charge, instead, is to consider the difficult truths that this case and the many others before it have laid bare.

Millions of our fellow citizens believe the justice system does not work for them – and, indeed, is actively working against them.

Millions of our fellow citizens are familiar with law enforcement only within the context of mistrust and antagonism.

Millions of our fellow citizens remain trapped in a cycle of poverty that fuels, and is fueled by, addiction, violence and hopelessness.

Millions of our fellow citizens, on a daily basis, experience the kind of bigotry and bias – be it subtle or overt – that millions more will never know.

Like the cases in Baltimore and Florida and Missouri, these truths, for millions of us, are distant. They are embodied by statistics and talking points, taken in through television reports, newspaper stories and Facebook posts. They are interpreted through lenses that suit our existing perspectives, placed within a context we find comfortable and self-affirming.

There is no easy way to address these truths, let alone solve them. But by keeping them at a distance, we find ourselves at the same place again and again.

The way forward is found through the truth that stands above all others – that we are all bound by our shared humanity. This is a moment to recommit to our core values of equality, justice and opportunity. This is a moment to open our minds and our hearts. This is a moment to recognize what lies beneath the violence and anger and hatred we’ve seen, and to strive together toward a better and brighter day.

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  • Wuggly

    Racism will never end, there will always be those individuals that hate and will discriminate. We as a society do not tolerate discrimination or abuse of another person.

    Now as a society we need to fix our laws, so called "Hate Crimes" is a discriminatory term. The term separates us into groups instead of just human. I don't care about the hatefulness of the perpetrator. The suspect injured or killed another human and should be tried on facts not feelings. The protests you speak of are a Right. When the protest turns violet it is no longer a protest or a Right, it becomes an assault, vandalism, robbery and arson and at that time is unacceptable in society.

    There are those in our society that continue "race bait" this is not new and should also not be tolerated.

    Booker T. Washington (1865–1915) told us as much such people in his 1911 book My Larger Education.

    “There is another class of coloured people who make a business of keeping the troubles, the wrongs and the hardships of the Negro race before the public. Having learned that they are able to make a living out of their troubles, they have grown into the settled habit of

    advertising their wrongs – partly because they want sympathy and partly because it pays. Some of these people do not want the Negro to lose his grievances, because they do not want to lose their jobs.” (p. 118)

    Thursday, May 7, 2015 Report this