[guilty by his mere existence] Message to Black Males from White Cleveland Cops: If You Reach for your Waistband, We Can Execute You

Video Shows White Cleveland Cop Shot Black Boy in 2 Seconds. A police officer who shot and killed a 12-year-old boy outside a Cleveland recreation center fired within two seconds after the patrol car he was riding in pulled up next to the boy, a video released on Wednesday by the Cleveland police showed.

The video, which was made public at the request of the boy’s family, showed the boy, Tamir Rice, walking in the park with what resembled a weapon on Saturday before the police arrived. When the cops arrived police claimed the officer yelled at Tamir three times to show his hands, but the boy instead reached to his waistband for the object, which turned out to be a fake gun. Then the cop shot him. [MORE]

The 4th Amendment requires reasonable articulable suspicion in to order to Stop and Seize someone. When white Cleveland cops arrived information from the radio run was not corroborated. 1) No "guy" or grown man was present - only a 12 yr old child. 2) There were no people around - the child was alone. 3) No gun was visible - the toy gun was in the childs pants and out of site when police arrived. When the cops arrived no crime was being committed in their presence and no visible danger was present. As such, there was no legal basis to order him to stop or to pull out their loaded weapons and point them at him in the first place. When they arrive they see a Black kid, alone. 

To legally justify the stop and seizure all that matters is what the cops saw when they arrived, that is; the first hand knowledge they had in the present moment of a Stop- whats on the video prior to the shooting was not seen by the cops - because they were not there yet. Watch the video for yourself, slowly.

When whites watch this video they see a Black male - in other words they see external phenomenon that triggers jealously, hatred and fear. The mere presence of a Black male is enough to water these seeds of anger and ignorance that are just below the surface with them. These white cops and white journalists observing this video are in deep attachment to a wrong view. Would the white cops have this kind of reaction formation to a white child?  

The Black Male as Inherently Criminal. The following is from Amos Wilson [HERE] "The perpetual domination of African Americans by White Ameri­cans psychically requires the White American criminalization of the African male, i.e., the White American perception of the African male as inherently criminal. In the context of White American domination there is no innocent Black male, just Black male criminals who have not yet been detected, apprehended or convicted. Their mere presence inspires in White Americans, fears of being assaulted, raped, robbed, or some other indefinable dread of being criminally victimized. Fantasies of the sexual molestation of White females by rapacious Black males are common to the White American male and female consciousness, and are frequent themes of their literary, cinematic, and pornographic productions.

For a very large percentage of White Americans, young Black males, sexual promiscuity, and criminality are synonymous. In the dominant White American consciousness the African male is existentially guilty, (i.e., he is guilty by his mere existence) for merely having the audacity of being alive. There is a pervasive feeling among many White Americans that their world would be much more secure if all young Black males were imprisoned, solitarily confined to their ghettos, or kept under constant surveillance. It is no quirky coincidence that such perceptions, feelings and attitudes toward African American males occur most prevalently within the context of White American dominance. Ultimately, criminality of the Black male regardless of its nature, truth or reality, resides in any act or attitude on the part of Black males which appears to White Americans to defy White American authority, control or dominance. It is White America which defines criminality and writes the criminal justice codes. It writes these codes not in the interest of justice as defined by its own moral code, but in the interest of maintaining, justifying and enforcing its continued dominance of the African American community." [MORE]