This is a week that has literally worn most of us out. We are tired of the unnecessary killing; we are hurt by the brutal truth of racism in the United States; we are devastated by the consequences of race, prejudice and power. We are exhausted. But yet, we are still thinking, talking, wondering, praying and asking questions. What can be done? How do you tackle a problem that is so complicated and massive? Even those who do important race education work on a daily basis feel overwhelmed by the magnitude of a national crisis involving race, power, and police. Community programs just won’t cut it. After school initiatives don’t really work for grown folk. What can we possibly do to enhance the culture, awareness and knowledge of police officers? And how do we hold them accountable when the justice system can’t or won’t?
These are heavy questions that I honestly can’t answer. So, I find myself thinking: What would Brother Malcolm do? I didn’t live during the sixties and thankfully I wasn’t taught much about Malcolm X by my public schools. This meant that I wasn’t bombarded with negative media coverage of him nor was I taught what to think of him by a biased school system. I was able to come to know him on my own and through his own words. What I know for sure is that Malcolm did not just preach and speak words to energize, instigate, or enlighten. He was about action-not the violent action, which has become the prevailing American narrative of his life. He moved beyond that and was brave enough to publicly denounce many of the words that he spoke before he began to travel the world and develop a global understanding of human rights. But this isn’t about arguing the life of Malcolm X. This is about meditating on our dear elder for insight and wisdom. Malcolm X never called for black folks to go to war, to engage in mass killing, or to initiate violence. His major call in all realms of social life was for education.
When it came to voting, it was him that reminded us that simply registering people to vote who aren’t educated on how the voting process works would not create the political change that we needed. He often called for black folks to educate themselves about themselves. He argued that African Americans had been taught everything that makes them who they are by their oppressors. How can someone who is oppressing you teach your history; teach you to love yourself; teach you that you are valuable and not worthless? They could, but they won’t because that undermines the whole point of oppression.
So, in this dark hour that our country is now witnessing I choose to remember Malcolm and his rallying cry for education. I believe that the only answer to all of this is a critical examination of the education, training, and screening of police candidates. I am sure that we will all agree that we probably don’t invest enough in developing, educating, and preparing the folks that protect our domestic safety (in comparison to the military which protects our global safety). But the reality is, on the home front, we got issues y’all.
Here is what Malcolm X said 50 years ago about police brutality:
“Instead of legislation, in my opinion it takes education. The whites ought to be re-educated so that the racism that they have in their hearts can be eliminated, and our people have to be re-educated so that we will know how to do something for ourselves instead of waiting for others to do it for us all the time. The press can make the American public love whom they will and hate whom they will. And that same process can be used to re-educate the American public and show white people how to love black people and show black people how to stand on our own two feet and solve our own problems.”
A nugget here is his suggestion that we use the powerful reach of the media as a venue to actually educate. Too often, in an effort to prove their unbiased nature (which is inherently false—it is impossible to be unbiased because every decision made on what to say, how to say it, what to cover, what to shoot, etc. etc. is made by people), the media wastes television time and space having futile discussions and debates about race. These debates offer very little opportunity for the public to truly be educated about race. This is ridiculous in a country that has literally hundreds of race educators and trainers like myself.
The fact that our country has at its core centuries of racial issues, yet a young person can finish twelve years of public education and not be taught about issues of race is astonishing. Some might say that’s the job of schools. But they aren’t doing it. Some might say that’s the job of parents. But are parents who are also uneducated about race prepared to educate their children? Some might say the churches should do it. But do you really think that will ever happen? And some might say if any media organization should take up the effort to educate it should be public television. Let PBS and NPR deal with that stuff. I say no. A mainstream media that reaches millions needs to step up. Broadcast intentional educational trainings or programs on race. Instead of constantly reporting our race problems, do something about it. We all have a role to play and many of us don’t have the powerful reach that you do.
Additionally, we need the media and entertainment industries to acknowledge and address the role that they play in advancing social stereotypes that make many see a black man and immediately think threat or thug. We need more than meaningless statements about how tragic these events are. We need you to stop promoting prejudice through the images, messages, and representations that dishonor black folks as human beings. As Malcolm X once said, “If you’re not careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people who are being oppressed, and loving the people who are doing the oppressing.“ So media, the police cant take all the weight. You have a load to bear as well. We want you to do better and do more.
But the police are the central players here. Police officers need to receive a better education. I surveyed several state training department websites for police academy procedures and qualifications to become a police officer. While, details are a local jurisdiction so there are some variations from state to state, in general these are the qualifications to become a police officer:
- Be at least 18 years old;
- Be a citizen of the United States;
- Have a high school diploma or its recognized equivalent;
- Not have been convicted by any state or by the federal government of any crime the punishment for which could have been imprisonment in the federal or state prison or institution nor have been convicted of enough misdemeanors to establish a pattern of disregard for the law;
- Contact the police academy that you wish to attend
- Undergo a background investigation;
- Successfully complete Asset or Compass Test. This exam must be completed prior to enrolling in any Basic Law Enforcement Course. Candidates who do not pass the entrance exam will be ineligible to retake the exam for a period of 30 days after an unsuccessful attempt.
- Complete a job application
- Be fingerprinted for the State Bureau of Investigation and the FBI to determine the existence of a criminal record;
- Undergo a physical examination by a licensed physician to determine any physical, emotional or mental conditions that may adversely affect the ability to exercise the powers or duties of a peace officer; and
- Be interviewed by the hiring manager
I know several thoughtful, intelligent, and professional police officers that proudly wear the uniform. I don’t mean to dishonor or insult them here. But, lets be honest these qualifications just aren’t enough for a job that gives their employees guns. I know corporations who wouldn’t trust a 20 year old to handle an account, an important computer program, or private company information; yet we give guns to folks that have only been educated in our not so well performing K-12 schools.
Basic on the job training involves somewhere between a $3-4000 tuition commitment and participation in roughly 10 weeks of training. This is like 2.5 months. I’m a college professor. All I do is teach college students and I had to have 20 years of education. I don’t save lives. I simply make people think. You are giving someone the power to end a life and they only receive 3 months of training. It’s not enough. I want someone that is vetted much more, educated much more, and who is much more mature policing my neighborhood. As Malcolm X said, “Education is the passport to the future.” If we want to create a better future for our country we need to get started truly educating its citizens, and particularly our law enforcement.
I honestly don’t want a minimally educated person teaching my son in school or pulling him over in the streets. It is time that states and our federal government invest more in the professional development, training, and education of police officers. The other issue is that as I reviewed some of the advanced training courses offered (most police training programs offer extensive optional training opportunities beyond basic); the only culturally focused course that I saw in the 10 states that I reviewed was a course on Islamic ideology. I would argue that there are a few other cultural communities, histories, and social experiences that officers need to learn about in order to not only police those communities, but also understand them. The single most important action that citizens should be vocal about right now is an overhaul of police basic training.
The final issue that I want to address is regarding public sentiment—not about the actual incidents but about race in America. I was listening to an NPR show where a caller, who identified himself as a white man, was earnestly sharing that the United States, as a country, was built on slavery but has yet to truly acknowledge it. His point was that one of the major factors for how the United States went from fledging colonies in an unknown land to the superpower that it is today, is because of the hundreds of years that they were able to build up the country using free labor and oppression. He argued that a country with that deep a history in racism has to face that history fully before it could ever truly move on.
I agree with this caller and it is one of the reasons that I was fascinated with the Truth & Reconciliation Hearings that occurred in South Africa after the end of apartheid. Citizens were allowed to vent, to scream and yell their pain, to tell the stories of their oppression, to force oppressors to hear what they did to the lives of people, and to allow space for those that were guilty of oppressing others to confess and ask for forgiveness. Speaking, truth telling, education, and healing are necessary after a past like ours. The radio host’s immediate comment to the caller was, “Yes but it is 2016, this is years away from slavery.” This type of thinking burns me up. It suggests that today isn’t linked to yesterday. We all simply appeared this very moment.
The past created our present. So, for example, five years ago my life was completely different. I was single, had no children and lived in Washington, DC. My life experiences have changed and undoubtedly impacted and affected me in significant ways, as I became a wife, a mother, and returned to live in a small southern town. Life is different, but the core of who I am isn’t different. In fact, the core of who I am was the same at 10 years old, 20 years old, and now 40 years old. I have had different experiences and I even live a different life than I lived as a child, but the core of who I am is still right there. That quiet, shy, inquisitive, nerdy 10 year old is still at the core of my soul. And such is the case with our country.
Oppression did not stop it simply transformed. Slavery turned into sharecropping. Sharecropping turned into Black Codes. Black codes turned into Jim Crow. Jim Crow turned into white flight and the economic breakdown in the African American community creating social deserts. This then led the way for the influx of drugs into the black community creating a way out for a community of desperately deprived people. Drug dealers became rich and escaped the realities of living in poverty and drug users became addicts who mentally escaped the realities of living in poverty. This then made way for one of the most devastating national campaigns on the African American community: The War on Drugs. The drug policies of the Reagan era created a media frenzy that demonized blackness. It created the fertile ground for more hostile police presence in black communities. It was the policy that first put police presence in public schools.
So, the incident that we saw at Spring Valley High school in my hometown of Columbia SC where the young girl was dragged by a police officer, would not have occurred had it not been for the drug policies of the 1980’s. Please don’t suggest that the past has nothing to do with today. The thing is we have become satiated with progress and not focused on social transformation. As brother Malcolm once said,
“You don’t stick a knife in a man’s back nine inches and then pull it out six inches and say you’re making progress ...Ever since Black folks were brought to America we’ve been demanding to be seen as fully human beings. Though we’ve made great strides, the rise in extra-judicial killings of unarmed citizens by law enforcement officers, the unequal judicial system, and the ever present influence of systematic racism continues to prevent Black Americans from accessing basic human rights.”
Tell me that statement doesn’t still hold weight today. We are back in a social state where black folks have to look down, act docile, and appear weak just to stay alive. I’m not quite sure if resisting arrest is a reason to die. It might mean that you are definitely going to jail, but it doesn’t warrant you being murdered. In fact, we debate the relevance of the death penalty for folks who have committed murder. So, we question if a murderer should be put to death, but its okay to kill a dude who was selling cigarettes and resisting arrest? This is insanity at its best. And we, the American citizens have the power to change this if we truly unite in order to make our states stronger.
If your local schools are failing the kids and pushing them out into the streets and into the hands of prisons, become involved. Let the schools know that community members not only care, but are also paying attention. Actively inquire about the content of police training and demand from every level of public servant assigned to your district increased education and training for officers. And if that means a small raise in taxes-pay it. I’d rather pay a few dollars now to better educate an officer, than to pay with my black son’s life in 15 years. We fought hard to be free and to live in these communities so we need to act like we own them. We need to become more than victims of an unfair society. We need to cash the check of full citizenship through voice and action. As Jessie Williams said, “… we are going to have equal rights and justice in our own country or we will restructure their function in ours.” For many of us, this week has been an absolute nightmare. And what do you do when you have a nightmare? You wake up!
“I see America through the eyes of the victim. I don’t see any American dream―I see an American nightmare.” Malcolm X