Here we go. Again.
The convergence of Black males and law enforcement produces unintended tragic results. The naïve expectations for convictions in the Sean Bell case are dashed by a “bench trial” decision. Serendipity and the Black female vote produces well-placed Black-elected officials who promise intense scrutiny and yet more legislation.
This week, we have the specter of Nicole Paultre-Bell, the grieving bride, being arrested in a nonviolent prayer of civil disobedience.
All of it makes for good talk radio. And even better video clips for television. Inspired promises of donations to civil rights organizations multiply. Lawsuits for wrongful death and civil rights violation move forward. But whose interests are really being served? Be careful what you pray for, you just may get it. Old-school Civil Rights folk have been having private meetings and public calls for a civil rights agenda that can unite large numbers of Black people into action. Just a couple of weeks ago, Rev. Al Sharpton asked listeners to his national radio show to call in with suggestions for a unifying agenda. Like clockwork, the Sean Bell verdict was the latest incarnation of obliging that wish.
One minute after the verdict was read, the predictable reactions began. Talking heads, both old and new, have been pontificating about the plight of the “oppressed” Black man in myriad venues – radio, television and press.
The tactic of “non-violent civil disobedience” has incarnated 21st-century style. New twists on an old story. Young Nicole, beautiful and dignified, is the latest in a long line of Black women used as the public face of Civil Rights actions solely for the benefit of Black men.
Nicole has a right to be angry. Her baby daddy was taken away hours before he belatedly stepped forward to marry her.
Many Black women are also angry. And conflicted.
Civil rights participation would include more than just “movement groupies” if there were commensurate citywide (or even borough-wide) community actions on behalf of Black women and children.
Few Black men say what many of them refuse to admit: decent Black men are afraid of challenging out-of-order, violent Black men for their behavior. Male posturing, as if carrying a gun does not help. If the men are afraid of each other, how are women, the most common victims, supposed to feel? The violent target is not just other Black men, but the weakest members of the Black community – women and children.
Despite all the legitimate concerns about excessive police brutality, Black (and Hispanic) women know the police are the only force strong enough to put out-of-order men in check.
Just last September, a wild shootout took place in the south-bound No.4 train pulling into 176th St., in the Bronx, during rush hour. Three undercover officers, two female and one male, confronted two men harassing passengers and riding between cars. Once removed from the train, one of the men put a female officer in a headlock and shot her three times. Her partners had no choice but to fire on him. The gunman died on the spot.
There were no citywide protests in support of the shot officer. No rallies arguing against shooting a female, or an officer. Not a word.
Many city women quietly whispered gratitude that the police removed one more man who demonstrated excessive violence towards a woman by shooting her.
To speak these ideas aloud is literally heresy.
If the loud argument is police should not behave as “judge, jury and executioner” on the streets, it should apply in all situations. But it doesn’t.
Despite the multiracial outrage in reaction to Judge Arthur Cooperman’s verdict acquitting the three officers charged in the Sean Bell case, there are many women who see the contradiction.
It is all too common for some Black men to shoot, beat, rape and rob Black women and coerce a few into stripping and prostitution. And Black children are not exempt.
Abuse of Black women is such a common thread in the fabric of the community, “It’s Hard Out Here for a Pimp” was named Best song in a movie during the Academic Awards a couple of years ago.
There are no rallies against pimping or trickin’. Behaviors that destroy the Black community form within are socially acceptable.
With all the attention the Kalua “strip club” received in the aftermath of the Bell shooting, there was no advocacy on behalf of the women who were “employed” as topless strippers. No little girls (even Black ones) say they want to grow up to be a stripper. Or a prostitute. Black men seem to have no problem with Black women having their dignity destroyed in order to comply with these immoral and illegal proclivities. The grooming starts in childhood with sexual abuse and pornography disguised as culture in music and videos.
The detectives involved in the Bell shooting were purportedly at Kalua because of allegations of prostitution and drug sales/ use taking place there.
Men of all cultures are exposed to these behaviors at some time in their lives. These activities are particularly devastating to the Black community, and lead to contact with the police. The dearth of men, especially Black male husband/ fathers, who call for order and decent male behaviors, leaves a vacuum which is filled by social disorder.
Once again, male taste for skin and sin invites the police in. With devastating results.
The police and the courts are charged with enacting social control. The men in the community seem incapable, or unwilling to do so. Civil rights activists selectively complain when efforts to establish order go horribly wrong.
And the dance card remains filled.
