Race had nothing to do with it, the way I saw it.
An off-duty police officer was simply fed up with neighborhood kids vandalizing his yard. So when he caught one of the brats red handed, he did something monumentally stupid, as fed-up men will sometimes do: he bolted from the house brandishing his service weapon.
I don't know what he was thinking, but there is no doubt in my mind that the aging policeman never meant for the gun to go off, striking the little boy in the leg. I can’t say I knew the guy, but I knew about him, and I will never be convinced that he intended to shoot a kindergartner for throwing stones.
White cop. Black boy.
I covered the resulting march on city hall as a young newspaper reporter. While the crowd gathered around a local civil rights activist before the march began, I managed to ask him a few questions:
Why are you doing this?
“Someone has to look out for this boy’s rights,” he said.
Do you really think this was a racial act?
“I have no idea.”
Then why not wait until all the facts come out? What about the officer’s rights?
“He has plenty of people looking out for his rights.”
As the group paraded down the street, following the cute little boy in the wheelchair with his leg still in a cast, I realized what was really going on. And race had everything to do with it.
It wasn’t about the shooting. It was about the ugly, jeering crowd that lined the street. They’re the ones who made it about race; the march only set the stage.
It was about the mob that turned out at the suburban city hall and the near-riot that ensued. I remember the helmets and batons, shields and assault rifles laid out on a long table inside the city building, just in case.
The anger on the white faces in the crowd said all that needed to be said. This wasn’t about a cop or a little boy to them, either. It was about choosing a side.
What left an impression on me – let’s call it a scar – was the smirk on the civil rights activist’s face as he and a few dozen of his supporters walked silently down the road while people called them names. He knew what he was doing – letting the ranting idiots who taunted them make his point for him. He played the bigots like puppets, and they responded exactly as he knew they would.
I’m reminded of that day when I see the mobs marching on Washington and elsewhere toting signs with racial caricatures and sayings directed at a black president. Like the mob at the march I witnessed, their anger seems out of proportion to whatever “socialist” strawman they came to protest this time.
It’s not about healthcare or taxes or whatever cause the ranting entertainers on TV and radio used to ratchet up these people’s rage. I know what it’s about and so do you. But we tolerate it the way we tolerate the crazy uncle who throws around racial slurs because “that’s just how he is – he’s really a nice guy.”
No, he’s not.
At what point do we demand that people who know better – from former congressmen and governors to TV talking heads who fan the flames of hatred for their own gain – defend their fiery, race-baiting remarks instead of treating them as “equal time?”
At what point should I speak up when a man remarks to me, as though I’d understand, that he doesn’t shop at the Kroger by his house because “everyone knows that’s the black Kroger.”
What do I say to the man who forwards me emails about patriotism and Jesus, riddled with ethnic slurs and calls for violence against Muslims?
The march I witnessed at city hall happened many years ago, but the Kroger remark happened last week and the latest email arrived yesterday. I responded by being polite, treating them like the crazy uncle who’s really a nice guy despite the vulgar stupidity that comes out of his mouth.
I suppose I will just continue to smirk and let the idiots reveal themselves for what they really are. But I’m getting awfully tired of being polite.
