******************** POSTING RULES & NOTES ******************** #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. *****************************************************************
The police are not there to serve you and me, or to do justice. They were invented and trained to put down crowd action (such as strikes) by the emerging working class in the period 1825-1855, as an excellent history I think posted to this list about 10 days ago pointed out, and so far as I can see, their training and their charge have not been changed. They are still acting in an arrogant and high-handed fashion to divide apart the working class, using force and racism, and to destroy capable members of the working class so they cannot revolt. The police are not rioting. They are just doing their job. Wythe Holt > On June 5, 2020 at 3:58 PM Louis Proyect via Marxism > <marxism@lists.csbs.utah.edu mailto:marxism@lists.csbs.utah.edu > wrote: > > > ******************** POSTING RULES & NOTES ******************** > #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. > #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. > #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. > ***************************************************************** > > NY Times Op-Ed, June 5, 2020 > The Police Are Rioting. We Need to Talk About It. > By Jamelle Bouie > > If we’re going to speak of rioting protesters, then we need to speak of > rioting police as well. No, they aren’t destroying property. But it is > clear from news coverage, as well as countless videos taken by > protesters and bystanders, that many police are using often > indiscriminate violence against people — against anyone, including the > peaceful majority of demonstrators, who happens to be in the streets. > > Rioting police have driven vehicles into crowds, reproducing the assault > that killed Heather Heyer in Charlottesville, Va., in 2017. They have > surrounded a car, smashed the windows, tazed the occupants and dragged > them out onto the ground. Clad in paramilitary gear, they have attacked > elderly bystanders, pepper-sprayed cooperative protesters and shot > “nonlethal” rounds directly at reporters, causing serious injuries. In > Austin, Texas, a 20-year-old man is in critical condition after being > shot in the head with a “less-lethal” round. Across the country, rioting > police are using tear gas in quantities that threaten the health and > safety of demonstrators, especially in the midst of a respiratory > disease pandemic. > > None of this quells disorder. Everything, from the militaristic posture > to the attacks themselves, does more to inflame and agitate protesters > than it does to calm the situation and bring order to the streets. In > effect, rioting police have done as much to stoke unrest and destabilize > the situation as those responsible for damaged buildings and burning > cars. But where rioting protesters can be held to account for > destruction and violence, rioting police have the imprimatur of the state. > > What we’ve seen from rioting police, in other words, is an assertion of > power and impunity. In the face of mass anger over police brutality, > they’ve effectively said So what? In the face of demands for change and > reform — in short, in the face of accountability to the public they’re > supposed to serve — they’ve bucked their more conciliatory colleagues > with a firm No. In which case, if we want to understand the behavior of > the past two weeks, we can’t just treat it as an explosion of wanton > violence, we have to treat it as an attack on civil society and > democratic accountability, one rooted in a dispute over who has the > right to hold the police to account. > > African-American observers have never had any illusions about who the > police are meant to serve. The police, James Baldwin wrote in his 1960 > essay on discontent and unrest in Harlem, “represent the face of the > white world, and that world’s real intentions are simply for that > world’s criminal profit and ease, to keep the black man corralled up in > his place.” This wasn’t because each individual officer was a bad > person, but because he was fundamentally separate from the black > community as a matter of history and culture. “None of the police > commissioner’s men, even with the best will in the world, have any way > of understanding the lives led by the people they swagger about in twos > and threes controlling.” > > Go back to the beginning of the 20th century, during America’s first age > of progressive reform, as the historian Khalil Gibran Muhammad does in > “The Condemnation of Blackness: Race, Crime, and the Making of Modern > Urban America,” and you’ll find activists describing how “policemen had > abdicated their responsibility to dispense colorblind service and > protection, resulting in an object lesson for youth: the indiscriminate > mass arrests of blacks being attacked by white mobs.” > > The police were ubiquitous in the African-American neighborhoods of the > urban North, but they weren’t there to protect black residents as much > as they were to enforce the racial order, even if it led to actual > disorder in the streets. For example, in the aftermath of the > Philadelphia “race riot” of 1918, one black leader complained, “In > nearly every part of this city peaceable and law-abiding Negroes of the > home-owning type have been set upon by irresponsible hoodlums, their > property damaged and destroyed, while the police seem powerless to > protect.” > > If you are trying to understand the function of policing in American > society, then even a cursory glance at the history of the institution > would point you in the direction of social control. And blackness in > particular, the historian Nikhil Pal Singh argues, was a state of being > that required “permanent supervision and if necessary direct domination.” > > The simplest answer to the question “Why don’t the American police > forces act as if they are accountable to black Americans?” is that they > were never intended to be. And to the extent that the police appear to > be rejecting accountability outright, I think it reflects the extent to > which the polity demanding it is now inclusive of those groups the > police have historically been tasked to control. That polity and its > leaders are simply rejected as legitimate wielders of authority over law > enforcement, especially when they ask for restraint. > > A New York Police Department that worked enthusiastically with > Republican mayors Rudy Giuliani and Michael Bloomberg — mayors who found > their core support among the white residents of the city — then rejected > the authority of Bill de Blasio, a Democrat backed by blacks and > Hispanics who had emphasized police reform when he was a candidate. Or > compare the contempt for President Barack Obama from representatives of > law enforcement to their near-worshipful posture toward President Trump. > > Yes, some of this reflects partisan politics — it’s in the nature of > policing that many of its practitioners tend to be more conservative > than most — but I think it’s also influenced by a sense that neither > Obama nor his appointees, like Eric Holder or Loretta Lynch, had the > right to criticize them or hold them to account. > > If that is the dynamic at work, then we should not be surprised when the > police respond, in the main, to demands for change from the policed with > anger and contempt. Nor should we be surprised by their willingness to > follow the lead of a figure like Trump, who has incited America’s police > forces to be even more violent with protesters (to say nothing of his > past praise for police abuse). > > Trump explicitly rejects the legitimacy of nonwhites as political > actors, having launched his political career on the need for more and > greater racial control of Muslims and Hispanic immigrants. Even without > his tough-guy posturing, Trump is someone who embodies the political and > social order the police have so often been called to defend. > > Which is all to say that the nightly clashes between protesters and the > police are, to an extent, a microcosm of larger disputes roiling this > nation: the pressures and conflicts of a diversifying country; the > struggle to escape an exclusive past for a more inclusive future; and > our constant battle over who truly counts — who can act as a full and > equal member of this society — and who does not. > > > _________________________________________________________ > Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm > Set your options at: > https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/wytheholt%40cox.net > _________________________________________________________ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
