How did I miss this story? (Ahmaud Arbery shooting in Georgia)[MERGED] (4 Viewers)

not entirely true

Nikole Hannah Jones, who knows a helluva lot more about the legacy of racism in the country than either of us, has talked about this notion that "racism (or racist) acts only exist inside the head of the potentially racist in question"

She frames it as an act of racism and talks about how - within the structure of racism in the country - it becomes a racist act. There's a focus on the act, rather than the individual - and I think your post is a good illustration as to why.

If you think that this act can never be known to be racist, because we can never know if these individuals are racist, then how do we have a conversation about racism in the country? We can't. It becomes psychoanalysis and really not efficient nor illustrative to discuss race.

Instead, the argument is that if the situation and its conclusion are reliably predictable or expected according to racist institutions in play, then the act is fairly discussed and analyzed as a racist act. Now, this doesn't have any legal binding, mind you. It's primarily for understanding and talking about how racism operates in this country on a daily basis.

So, while this might be a bit presumptive, I'd say that if we applied that to this case, what would we see that is the product of the legacy of racist practices and policies in the context of the country/area.

Black guy running through a white neighborhood being seen as a 'criminal'? Definitely qualifies.
Two white guys feeling as if the life of a visible minority worth less than a nonviolent/nonthreatening offense? Yes.
The treatment by the law apparatus, investigator, etc treating this as a less than case or demonstrating some preferential treatment by the white killers? Yes.
History of law enforcement and harassment of the black guy by - in this case - one of his murderers? Yes.
The post-event treatment and publicity of the 'trespassing' accusations with video that might not even be the guy (the 'they all look alike') as mitigating the 'deservedness'? Yes.
The reflection of this event in the experiences of a *lot* of blacks, much more broadly, in neighborhoods similarly profiled? Yes.
The desensitized, synecdoche-esque treatment of his physical body? Absolutely.
The 'forgiveness' of the other white people caught on camera at the same property in question? Yes.

And so on.

There are a ton of flags here. And I think discussing it as a racist act is absolutely reasonable. It fits so many well-established criteria of racist acts and practices and attitudes - like, a lot - that discussing as a racist event is absolutely merited.

This isn't about 'convicting' the two individuals as 'racist' as much as it needs to become a vehicle by which society improves.

Because if we stop the discussion every time 'what's in his head?' comes up, we'll never discuss it. And that's definitely what some people would rather, but it's not at all constructive. And it would let a *lot* of guilty people and acts go free.

But, more importantly, to do so would show people of color that we don't care about them or their discrimination or the indignities and suspicion they live with day by day. We show all sorts of compassion for the 'mentality' or 'psyche' of these individuals who commit the acts, but we end up ignoring the 'mentality' and 'psyche' of people who experience it directly or communally - and that's not even close to fair. It results in alienation of the people to whom we should be paying the *most* attention in the wake of something like this.

How much are we talking about these two individuals?

How much are we talking about the victim? His family? The mistreatment and subjugation of blacks, esp by whites in areas they are told 'you don't belong'? How much are we discussing the legacy of racism that leads to situations like this?

Not a whole lot.

Because people, too often, want to talk about whether or not two white dudes are racist - to do that, I think we're missing a much more important point.

Thanks for posting this. I think this laid things out very eloquently
 
I wouldnt give a sheet if he had previously served time for assault or dealing drugs. I wouldnt care if they had video of him stealing tools from the job site. I wouldnt care because none of it would have any relevance to what happened.

He could have taken a dump in the house, stolen some tools, and walked out and screamed "fork ALL WHITE PEOPLE" and I still wouldnt care becasue none of that gives those two the right to corner and murder him.

Based on the information available, give them the death penalty and there needs to be a federal investigation into the local police

From that last link, it seems the police department has already been in a lot of trouble outside of this case.
 
Honestly, it was the broad stroke “whites gonna white” that irked me.....just as it does every time anyone relates a single act to a race of people.

So, this post, particularly this passage, was a few pages back, and, while we've had a great discussion in the ensuing pages I wanted to circle back to this sentiment because I feel it could be a good teaching moment about advantage/privilege/race for all of us.

So, the poster expresses annoyance and irritation at the statement "whites gonna white", presumably because they are white and they feel that is too broad of a brush, it is too harsh of an indictment, of one people for the actions of a few. So, they take issue with that statement. And I get that. I really do.

So, what I would offer to the poster, and everyone reading, is imagine being born into a world, living in a world, working in a world, raising a family in a world, trying to succeed in a world and trying to exist in a world where "blacks gonna black" isn't just an annoying, irritable statement on a message board, it's an implied, assumed and actionable sentiment in a society where entire institutions and constructs have been created to perpetuate, criminalize, enforce and promulgate that sentiment. That blacks will be blacks. Imagine.

That is truly what killed Ahmaud. Since his murder, video has shown other residents going into the construction site and looking around. Other persons across the country have admitted to trespassing on such sites and curiously looking around. Why was Ahmaud's curiosity seen and treated as criminal by the McMichaels? Why was Ahmaud's murder, initially, treated and handled, not as a victim, but as a criminal? That sentiment, that sentiment of criminality, of suspicion, devalued his life to the shooters and to the justice system. Because, see, you can believe someone did something wrong and not get into your pickup truck, with loaded guns, chase the down and ultimately take their life. You can believe someone may have committed a crime but still prosecute vigilante justice. But you have to see them as a person first. You need to have a value on their life on an equal footing as yours.

That is the world Ahmaud lived in. The world Trayvon lived in. The world I live in. The world so many other minority men and women live in. A world that has stigmatized one's color and sees it as suspicious, as criminal and is less valued than others. I've enjoyed these words before and I will do so again:

You can't thingify anything without depersonalizing that something. If you use something as a means to an end at that moment you make it a thing and you depersonalize it. The fact is that the negro was a slave in this country for 244 years. That act, that was a willful thing that was done. The negro was brought here in chains and treated in very inhuman fashion. And this led to the thingification of the negro. So he was not looked upon as a person. He was not looked upon as a human being with the same status and worth as other human beings. And the other thing is, human beings cannot continue to do wrong withouth eventually rationalizing that wrong. So slavery was justified; morally, biologically, theoretically, scientifically, everything else.

And many Negroes by the thousands and millions have been left bootless as a result of all of these years of Oppression and as a result of a society that deliberately made his color a stigma and something worthless and degrading."


Those were Dr. King's words. Ponder, really meditate, on the power and reality of this statement: "...a society that deliberately made his color a stigma and something worthless and degrading." The weight of that. That even I, a successful black man, carries around the burden of. I live in an affluent neighborhood and when I go jogging, I bring my dog with me, like countless of other Americans. But, do you know why I do it? Not because I enjoy walking with him (I do). Not because it's good exercise for us (it is). Not because it helps us bond (it does). It's because I'm a black man in a nice neighborhood and having my dog with me projects legitimacy. It provides a sense of belonging. Not for me! I know I belong there. My bills remind me of that. It's for the persons watching me. The persons curious and uncomfortable with my presence. Because, after all, who would go to someone else's neighborhood to walk their dog?

That stigma doesn't just go away y'all. I really wish it did. I really forking wish it did. Like, I don't think enough people acknowledge, realize or think about that part of it. We want things to be better. To be equal. Who would want to live that way?! If there was equality, don't you think I would be shouting about it from the mountaintops? I would strongly check anyone forking up the church money LOL! "Nah fam, things are equal, gone head with that bullshirt. You were ignant. That's why that happened." I would be one of the first ones defending our equal society because I would stand the most to gain from it!

You know, I'm thinking about a few weeks ago. Before Covid, I was bouncing back and forth between Dallas and Atlanta a lot. Meaning, I hadn't been at my home in Louisiana for a few. Now, I'm back here but perhaps persons weren't used to me being back. Anyway, I made a grocery run and I'm sitting in my truck, in my driveway. Just answering emails, answering texts, and sending out stuff too. So I notice a police SUV come up the street. My house is the 2nd to last on a dead end so when you get to the cross street, you either have to turn down it or you are going to my house or my neighbors. So, they get to the side street, pause, turn down it, but I notice he is making the block, presumably to pass back. So, I already know what time it is. Sure enough, a few minutes later, here comes the SUV, very slowly coming up this time. So when they get close enough, I hit the button to open the garage door and I get out. You know, legitimacy, prove you belong kind of thing. I just leave the groceries in the truck. I walk inside and purposefully hold up my fob, to close the door, so they can see me closing it myself. They speed up, turn down the side street and go on their way. I end up going back out a few minutes later to get the grub.

There's no doubt in my mind had I just sat there (defiantly, in their mind) they would have approached me. It dawns on me now, telling the story to yall, how without a thought I knew I had to do something to show I belonged. And that they knew and understood that unspoken language between us. And if I didn't, there would be a confrontation, which may not go in my favor. Now that I really think of it, it just saddens me. That I've conditioned myself to live like that. That it's necessary to do so to be left alone. That it's expected for me to do so or risk confrontation over it. I'm just sad that Ahmaud's last moments had to be filled with that fear, possibly thinking what did he do to deserve to die like that. I can't help him. What's worse, I can't adequately answer that question for him. Because I can't answer it for myself.

Whites being white. I get it. Imagine if the anguish and the pain of that stigma didn't go away once you logged off or closed out the browser. Imagine.
 
So, this post, particularly this passage, was a few pages back, and, while we've had a great discussion in the ensuing pages I wanted to circle back to this sentiment because I feel it could be a good teaching moment about advantage/privilege/race for all of us.

So, the poster expresses annoyance and irritation at the statement "whites gonna white", presumably because they are white and they feel that is too broad of a brush, it is too harsh of an indictment, of one people for the actions of a few. So, they take issue with that statement. And I get that. I really do.

So, what I would offer to the poster, and everyone reading, is imagine being born into a world, living in a world, working in a world, raising a family in a world, trying to succeed in a world and trying to exist in a world where "blacks gonna black" isn't just an annoying, irritable statement on a message board, it's an implied, assumed and actionable sentiment in a society where entire institutions and constructs have been created to perpetuate, criminalize, enforce and promulgate that sentiment. That blacks will be blacks. Imagine.

That is truly what killed Ahmaud. Since his murder, video has shown other residents going into the construction site and looking around. Other persons across the country have admitted to trespassing on such sites and curiously looking around. Why was Ahmaud's curiosity seen and treated as criminal by the McMichaels? Why was Ahmaud's murder, initially, treated and handled, not as a victim, but as a criminal? That sentiment, that sentiment of criminality, of suspicion, devalued his life to the shooters and to the justice system. Because, see, you can believe someone did something wrong and not get into your pickup truck, with loaded guns, chase the down and ultimately take their life. You can believe someone may have committed a crime but still prosecute vigilante justice. But you have to see them as a person first. You need to have a value on their life on an equal footing as yours.

That is the world Ahmaud lived in. The world Trayvon lived in. The world I live in. The world so many other minority men and women live in. A world that has stigmatized one's color and sees it as suspicious, as criminal and is less valued than others. I've enjoyed these words before and I will do so again:

You can't thingify anything without depersonalizing that something. If you use something as a means to an end at that moment you make it a thing and you depersonalize it. The fact is that the negro was a slave in this country for 244 years. That act, that was a willful thing that was done. The negro was brought here in chains and treated in very inhuman fashion. And this led to the thingification of the negro. So he was not looked upon as a person. He was not looked upon as a human being with the same status and worth as other human beings. And the other thing is, human beings cannot continue to do wrong withouth eventually rationalizing that wrong. So slavery was justified; morally, biologically, theoretically, scientifically, everything else.

And many Negroes by the thousands and millions have been left bootless as a result of all of these years of Oppression and as a result of a society that deliberately made his color a stigma and something worthless and degrading."


Those were Dr. King's words. Ponder, really meditate, on the power and reality of this statement: "...a society that deliberately made his color a stigma and something worthless and degrading." The weight of that. That even I, a successful black man, carries around the burden of. I live in an affluent neighborhood and when I go jogging, I bring my dog with me, like countless of other Americans. But, do you know why I do it? Not because I enjoy walking with him (I do). Not because it's good exercise for us (it is). Not because it helps us bond (it does). It's because I'm a black man in a nice neighborhood and having my dog with me projects legitimacy. It provides a sense of belonging. Not for me! I know I belong there. My bills remind me of that. It's for the persons watching me. The persons curious and uncomfortable with my presence. Because, after all, who would go to someone else's neighborhood to walk their dog?

That stigma doesn't just go away y'all. I really wish it did. I really forking wish it did. Like, I don't think enough people acknowledge, realize or think about that part of it. We want things to be better. To be equal. Who would want to live that way?! If there was equality, don't you think I would be shouting about it from the mountaintops? I would strongly check anyone forking up the church money LOL! "Nah fam, things are equal, gone head with that bullshirt. You were ignant. That's why that happened." I would be one of the first ones defending our equal society because I would stand the most to gain from it!

You know, I'm thinking about a few weeks ago. Before Covid, I was bouncing back and forth between Dallas and Atlanta a lot. Meaning, I hadn't been at my home in Louisiana for a few. Now, I'm back here but perhaps persons weren't used to me being back. Anyway, I made a grocery run and I'm sitting in my truck, in my driveway. Just answering emails, answering texts, and sending out stuff too. So I notice a police SUV come up the street. My house is the 2nd to last on a dead end so when you get to the cross street, you either have to turn down it or you are going to my house or my neighbors. So, they get to the side street, pause, turn down it, but I notice he is making the block, presumably to pass back. So, I already know what time it is. Sure enough, a few minutes later, here comes the SUV, very slowly coming up this time. So when they get close enough, I hit the button to open the garage door and I get out. You know, legitimacy, prove you belong kind of thing. I just leave the groceries in the truck. I walk inside and purposefully hold up my fob, to close the door, so they can see me closing it myself. They speed up, turn down the side street and go on their way. I end up going back out a few minutes later to get the grub.

There's no doubt in my mind had I just sat there (defiantly, in their mind) they would have approached me. It dawns on me now, telling the story to yall, how without a thought I knew I had to do something to show I belonged. And that they knew and understood that unspoken language between us. And if I didn't, there would be a confrontation, which may not go in my favor. Now that I really think of it, it just saddens me. That I've conditioned myself to live like that. That it's necessary to do so to be left alone. That it's expected for me to do so or risk confrontation over it. I'm just sad that Ahmaud's last moments had to be filled with that fear, possibly thinking what did he do to deserve to die like that. I can't help him. What's worse, I can't adequately answer that question for him. Because I can't answer it for myself.

Whites being white. I get it. Imagine if the anguish and the pain of that stigma didn't go away once you logged off or closed out the browser. Imagine.

As great and important a post as has been written on SR.com in 20 years.

Well done, sir.
 
There's no doubt in my mind had I just sat there (defiantly, in their mind) they would have approached me. It dawns on me now, telling the story to yall, how without a thought I knew I had to do something to show I belonged. And that they knew and understood that unspoken language between us. And if I didn't, there would be a confrontation, which may not go in my favor. Now that I really think of it, it just saddens me. That I've conditioned myself to live like that. That it's necessary to do so to be left alone. That it's expected for me to do so or risk confrontation over it. I'm just sad that Ahmaud's last moments had to be filled with that fear, possibly thinking what did he do to deserve to die like that. I can't help him. What's worse, I can't adequately answer that question for him. Because I can't answer it for myself.
for awhile we lived in the lake vista part of gentilly
i was back visiting my parents (i'm in my 20s i guess) and there's 2 lawn care guys (1 older and 1 younger AA)
the older guy was talking regular to the young one, i walked up to ask something and the older one just snaps into a super deferential tone to me, "yes sir what can i help you with sir" etc (i was at least 30 years younger than him)
it was a night and day shift
it shocked me and i felt so awkward/bad - i knew there was nothing i could say like 'you don't have to talk to me like that, just talk normal' - anything said would have made everything even more awkward (for me- i can't speak for him obviously

i still feel that moment to this day
 
Hahaha.....that is true.

However, short of being there when it happened and part of the investigation, you don’t know.

But you are correct, I made an assumption you didn’t know, while you could have been there in the inside and in the know.

Honestly, it was the broad stroke “whites gonna white” that irked me.....just as it does every time anyone relates a single act to a race of people.

We all know there’s complete idiots in all groups.

It doesn’t represent the group.....you just have to take every single person at face value.

What happened to change your POV? What made you stop applying broad strokes of your own?

I don't keep up with the discussions on here that much. I skim something terrible, jump from page-to-page in the hella-long threads, so I missed your metamorphosis.

 
So @Outbackjack, if you were out for a morning run and two black guys started chasing after you in a truck and then caught up to you and one of them jumped out with a shotgun blocking your exit what would you do? IMO, there was simply no value added to this discussion by posting that video. Frankly, I find it a damn shame that you posted it.
I'd still like to know the reason for posting the video and what you would do in the same scenario.
 
What happened to change your POV? What made you stop applying broad strokes of your own?

I don't keep up with the discussions on here that much. I skim something terrible, jump from page-to-page in the hella-long threads, so I missed your metamorphosis.

i miss Shizzle
 

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