Maybe it’s not really such a black and white issue
Another Black Lives Matter protest was held last week, yet as far as I’m aware, not one black person has been killed by police innew Zealand.
I could be wrong, but how many can you name off the top of your head?
Once borders reopen and international flights resume, perhaps those Black Lives Matter protesters in New Zealand can hop on the next flight to Minneapolis instead of protesting from 13,000 kilometres away.
When they get there, they can approach J Alexander Keung, 26 – one of the former Minneapolis cops charged in relation to the death of George Floyd – and yell at him.
Keung, who is out on bail, was grocery shopping when he was harassed and filmed by a shopper who posted the interaction online. The individualwho filmed Keung is unfortunately, likemany in this day and age, quick to jump to conclusions.
ABC 7 reported that Keung, who is African American – yes, he’s black – and one other officer who was charged had ‘‘been police officers for just four days when Floydwas killed’’.
Another one of the four officers who was charged is of Southeast Asian Hmong descent. Wait a minute… I thought theywere all white racists? Hush, we can’t disrupt the dominant narrative of the ‘‘racistwhite cop’’. More on that later.
Kueng’s lawyer Tom Plunkett said Keung was raised by his single mother onminneapolis’ predominantly black north side and became a police officer because he ‘‘wanted tomake his community a better place’’.
So, how’d Keung and the other rookie end up in thismess after just four days on the job?
Plunkett and the lawyer representing the other rookie cop have argued that both officers had no choice but to follow the instructions of Derek Chauvin – the cop who everyone agrees killed George Floyd.
That’s true. Anyone who has been a police officer knows that once you hit the beat as a new cop you follow the instructions of the senior officer you’re workingwith. No ifs, no buts. You rely on the senior officer to make the right decisions.
Further, police recruits are taught to never question superiors – full stop. Yes, they should have intervened, but it’s easier said than donewithin the power dynamics of a police force.
But what about all the other cases of cops killing blacks in the
United States?
Yes, the Washington Post’s database on police fatal shootings shows ‘‘half of the people shot and killed by police are white’’ and that blacks ‘‘account for less than 13 per cent of the US population, but are killed by police at more than twice the rate of white Americans’’. So, yes – blacks are killed by police at a disproportionate rate in terms of the population.
However, a big however – although African Americans comprise 13 per cent of the US population, according to an article in the Wall Street Journal earlier in June, ‘‘African-americans made up 53 per cent of known homicide offenders in the US and commit about 60 per cent of robberies’’. Hence, they are disproportionately more likely to be in encounters with police where lethal force is employed.
To throw a spanner in the works, a 2017 study on ‘‘racial differences in police use of force’’ by Harvard University’s Professor Roland Fryer found there were large racial differences in police use of nonlethal force, but ‘‘no racial differences in either the raw data or when contextual factors are taken into account’’ for officerinvolved shootings.
Fryer wrote an op-ed earlier this week restating his study findings that he ‘‘didn’t find racial differences in officer-involved shootings’’. Oh OK, so racistwhite cops, or racist black and racist Asian cops, aren’t trigger-happy when it comes to African Americans?
I can hear the screaming now: ‘‘Professor Fryer is another white racist!’’ Unfortunately, he’s African American – yes, he’s black too, just like ex-officer Keung.
Finally, the earlier mentioned WSJ article pointed out that in the US ‘‘a police officer is 181⁄ times more likely to be killed by a black male than an unarmed black male is to be killed by a police officer’’.
But hey, what good are facts when it doesn’t suit the narrative?
Disclaimer: Steve Elers’ background includes police service in Australia.
Steve Elers is a senior lecturer at Massey University’s School of Communication, Journalism and Marketing who writes aweekly column for Stuff on social and cultural issues. His views are his own and do not representmassey University.