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If I had been there, that would have been me, and with my gray beard and thick eyeglasses, I damned well would have been threatening.
What the hell kind of country is this where a grown man throws around an unarmed 14-year-old girl in a bikini and other grown men are just going to say, "Oh, well?" What's wrong with some of you? Didn't watch enough Lone Ranger as boys?
No, I know what's wrong, and you've already said it: You simply don't see black children as children, even if it's a middle-class suburban girl in a bikini.
I believe you have most of us pegged wrong. Yes there is a time and place for an adult to step forward but in the middle of a Police situation as it occurs in not the right time or place.
I would also step forward when judgment says it's OK. And you are also wrong that most of us whites would not step forward because the girl was Black.
Yet that cop apparently has no fear whatsoever of the white guy who appears to be looming over him!
Amazing!
Don't make that racial. That big lug had been standing there even before the Cop arrived. The 19yo came at the Cop from his blind side as he was taking down the girl.
The cop never saw the color of the teen, just the threat that was approaching from his blind side.
Don't make that racial. That big lug had been standing there even before the Cop arrived. The 19yo came at the Cop from his blind side as he was taking down the girl.
The cop never saw the color of the teen, just the threat that was approaching from his blind side.
After which he stopped, turned, looked at them, they started retreating slightly, and THEN he pulled his gun.
It's all on the video. We've all seen it, although some of us see it different ways, apparently.
Look, I don't think the officer in question is some vicious "black-hating racist" or the like. I get that he was emotionally on edge from earlier calls, but unfortunately that is part of the job of being a cop. There were 11 other officers there, all of whom were not acting the same way. And nobody "ran up towards him" until he grabbed the girl and took her to the ground (and if you look, almost everyone came running when he did that, not just the two teens he pulled his gun on). I'm sorry, but when i was teenager and a cop was acting completely at odds with every other officer on the scene, grabbed a friend of mine and dragged them to the ground, I'd almost certainly have run up as well. I guess that means I might get shot.
As multiple other posters have noted, many people ratchet up their "threat level" when a black person does something as opposed to a white person doing the exact same thing. I'm not talking about a type of outright racism as when someone deliberately looks for any action by a black person to condemn them as bad (as was demonstrated by a couple other posters earlier in this thread), but rather an almost subconscious filtering that occurs. Sometimes those little margins of reaction make all the difference.
This was not a riot. This was not Ferguson or Baltimore. This was a bunch of teenagers at a party which had got out of hand. When the cops arrived they all started to disperse. This one officer managed to raise tensions all on his own. His actions towards the young girl were over the top. Even if he did want to detain her, he still used excessive force. By the same token, drawing his gun was also over the top. Yeah, some of the kids reacted to his manhandling of the girl but not to the extent that he needed to use his gun. He is very lucky that the other two cops got to him before he did something really stupid.
11 cops managed to behave responsibly, appropriately and professionally. This one did not. So why has he resigned? Again, this was not a riot. This was middle class kids at a pool party. And middle class America does not want to see its kids abused by strong arm tactics from police officers. And the City of McKinney is considered to be one of the best places to live in the area. It is a middle class and upper middle class community. The last thing the City wants is its name being dragged through the gutter by suggestions that its police department is out of control. They don't want to do anything that will discourage tax paying, middle class people to come and live there. In my opinion, this officer has been told to resign or be fired. The City and the Police Dept. have acted quickly to get on top of the crisis.
how is an authority figure supposed to maintain control and order when no one respects or listens to him/her?
Ask any cop you know about going to a scene where a crap load of teens are laughing and mouthing off and not respecting the badge...these aren't kids...these are young adults that could cause serious injury or death...
what is a cop supposed to do when some 14 year old is mouthing off, not listening, and BY her actions inciting others to be JUST AS defiant...those cops had NO control over that situation, it was out of hand...
This was not a riot. This was not Ferguson or Baltimore. This was a bunch of teenagers at a party which had got out of hand. When the cops arrived they all started to disperse. This one officer managed to raise tensions all on his own. His actions towards the young girl were over the top. Even if he did want to detain her, he still used excessive force. By the same token, drawing his gun was also over the top. Yeah, some of the kids reacted to his manhandling of the girl but not to the extent that he needed to use his gun. He is very lucky that the other two cops got to him before he did something really stupid.
11 cops managed to behave responsibly, appropriately and professionally. This one did not. So why has he resigned? Again, this was not a riot. This was middle class kids at a pool party. And middle class America does not want to see its kids abused by strong arm tactics from police officers. And the City of McKinney is considered to be one of the best places to live in the area. It is a middle class and upper middle class community. The last thing the City wants is its name being dragged through the gutter by suggestions that its police department is out of control. They don't want to do anything that will discourage tax paying, middle class people to come and live there. In my opinion, this officer has been told to resign or be fired. The City and the Police Dept. have acted quickly to get on top of the crisis.
HE was FORCED to resign so the peaceful protests in McKinney didn't turn into riots...we are now catering to the lowest common denominator..
how is an authority figure supposed to maintain control and order when no one respects or listens to him/her?
Ask any cop you know about going to a scene where a crap load of teens are laughing and mouthing off and not respecting the badge...these aren't kids...these are young adults that could cause serious injury or death...
what is a cop supposed to do when some 14 year old is mouthing off, not listening, and BY her actions inciting others to be JUST AS defiant...those cops had NO control over that situation, it was out of hand...
how is an authority figure supposed to maintain control and order when no one respects or listens to him/her?
Ask any cop you know about going to a scene where a crap load of teens are laughing and mouthing off and not respecting the badge...these aren't kids...these are young adults that could cause serious injury or death...
what is a cop supposed to do when some 14 year old is mouthing off, not listening, and BY her actions inciting others to be JUST AS defiant...those cops had NO control over that situation, it was out of hand...
I honestly can't even tell if you're being serious.
"Ask any cop you know about going to a scene where a crap load of teens are laughing and mouthing off and not respecting the badge"
It's their constitutional right to do so, but I'm not even going to logically dissect your post because it would be a waste of time.
The two posts by Jaggy and Synch sum up this incident perfectly.
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