What NOT to do if you're black and stopped by the police

Left in Alabama co-blogger in chief countrycat says " surprisingly people don't know their rights when it comes to interaction with the police", and proceeds to advise white people what their rights are when they are stopped by the police.  Yes, I said advise white people, because black people don't have the same rights.  They just don't, but this is what happens when there is a lack of diversity (for lack of a better word) at Alabama's Informed. Involved.  Progressive. blog of record.

More per countrycat:

This simple sentence: "I do not consent to this search," is one of the most important tools you have to protect your constitutional rights during a police stop. 

Now I'm not calling countrycat naive, but the only rights black folks have when it comes interacting with the Po Po is to stay black, and try and live through the interaction.  Politely telling the Po-Po you do not consent to this search is asking to be arrested (if you're lucky),  a mega beat down, or worse.  And the last thing you want to do is reach for your handy know your rights card because police might think you are reaching for a gun.

This really funny video by comedian Chris Rock tells black folks what to do when stopped by the police.  If you follow these easy tips you'll be fine.  Warning video contains raw but real language.

#leftinbama

It's Not a Happy Thanksgiving in the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave

There is not a lot to be happy (not to be confused with grateful) about this Thanksgiving.  In case you've been living under a rock the United States of America looks like Syria, or some other place in the Middle East in need of some Free Dumb and Democracy quick, fast and in a hurry.  African Americans are under attack in the USA.  I can't confirm, but I suspect this is a black, I mean back lash because we dared exercise our civic duty and elect an African American President not once, but twice.  I know you are mad we have a black President, but please don't take it out on us.  If I had known white America was going to go this crazy I would have voted for Hillary.  

I don't know why white America is mad because we have an African American President, he's done more for them than he has black folks.  I kind of figured black folks were going to get screwed when candidate Obama threw his long time pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, under the bus so white folks would vote for him.  

My second clue was when President Obama backed down from saying a Boston policeman acted stupidly when they arrested Dr. Henry Louis Gates in his own damn house for being uppity. 

My third clue was when the white, male dominated media made him distance himself for Attorney Eric Holder's "America is a nation of cowards when it comes to discussing matter of race" statement during a Black History Month program at the Justice Department of all places

I could go on and on about my disappointment and disillusionment in America's first half black President, but that's not the topic I want to write about today.  I want to write about Ferguson Burning.

Ferguson burned. The police protected the White side of town while allowing businesses on the Black side to be robbed and burned. At least 12 buildings were on fire. Most protesters, though, were peaceful. At two in the morning the police held a press conference. They blamed protesters for tearing apart “the fabric of the community”.

Now you won't hear about this in the white, male dominated mainstream US  media, because it doesn't fit the media driven racial stereotype of "violent protest" out of control black brutes, angry because they can't have their way, but Mike Brown's fathers church was burned to the ground.

A Ferguson, Mo., church gutted by fire on Monday was targeted by white supremacists because the pastor had publicly called for Police Officer Darren Wilson to be arrested, Rev. Carlton Lee alleged in an interview.
Flood Christian Church was one of more than a dozen buildings and businesses damaged by arsonists in the St. Louis suburb overnight after a grand jury chose not to indict Wilson in the shooting death of a black teen.
Lee was an ever-present fixture next to Michael Brown Sr. in the months after his son, Michael Brown Jr., was killed in a violent confrontation with Wilson on Aug. 9. The elder Brown was even baptized at the church on Sunday.

 Let me put this black folks can't demand equal rights because of black on black crime meme to rest once and for all.  Black folks don't march when black folks kill each other for the same reason white folks don't march when white folks kill each other.  Black folks do not commit the most crimes because they are black, black folks are convicted of committing the most crimes because they are black.

What is wrong with this argument:

1. It is a deflection. The people who make it do not truly care about black-on-black crime.
2. It creates a false choice: Most who are truly concerned with black-on-black crime were upset about the Zimmerman case too.
3. It allows the white press to determine reality, which makes it seem like Zimmerman is an exception while no one is doing anything about black-on-black crime. As it turns out, on average there is a Zimmerman-style shooting (armed security person or vigilante killing an unarmed black person) once every 28 hours. Trayvon Martin is just what made the papers. His case is hardly the worst nor the only one to get protests. Likewise, there is plenty being done about black-on-black crime, like by the Nation of Islam, but the white press is not particularly interested in reporting that either. Even worse, the white press turns a blind eye to the bad policing that leads to a high black crime rate. Yet, somehow, it always seems to find time to show black male suspects on the 11 o’clock news.
4. Crime is mostly intra-racial. That means there will always be way more black-on-black crime than white-on-black crime. While it is true that 94% of black murders are black-on-black, it is just as true that 86% of white murders are white-on-white. In fact, most crime in America is white-on-white – yet for every web page that mentions “white-on-white crime”, there are 25 that mention “black-on-black crime”.
5. It makes the worth of black life conditional. Conditional on good behaviour, like low crime rates. Once blacks get black-on-black crime under control, then they can act as if their lives matter, then they can act as if they should have justice, then they can act as if they are human beings with human rights. Meanwhile the worth of white life is taken seriously, as absolute, as not being conditional. Compare Nicole Simpson to Trayvon Martin:
   • No one belittled the killing of Nicole Simpson by quoting white crime statistics, saying “white people kill each other all the time, what’s the big deal?”
   • No one deflected by talking about white parenting or violence in white films.
   • No one made Nicole Simpson posters for target practice.
   • No one pretended to be a dead Nicole Simpson for laughs.
   • No one questioned Nicole Simpson’s character – or her choice in clothing.

Ferguson is right to resist by any means and all means necessary.   We shall not remain calm while we're being attacked.  We shall Overcome.....

We didn't land on Plymouth Rock Plymouth Rock landed on us.

Psst President Obama! You could have been Trayvon Martin 4 years ago....

  Yassuh, Boss, Right Away 

So, the white, male, dominated media is patting themselves on the back for allowing President Obama to talk about race for the second time in 5 years after being prodded/pushed to do so by black folks.  Tavis Smiley had the audacity to tell the truth on Meet the Pest, I mean, Press Sunday and got a royal beat down on twitter .

To be clear, this is WHAT Tavis said Sunday on Meet the Press:

   The media narrative now is that Obama walked to the podium for an unscripted address because he felt he needed to say something. But the truth is that “he was pushed to the podium,” Smiley said. “A week of protests outside the White House, pressure building on him inside the White House, pushed him to that podium.” Smiley noted he did“appreciate and applaud the fact that the president did finally show up.” But “the bottom line is, this is not Libya. This is America. On this issue, you cannot lead from behind. What’s lacking in this moment is moral leadership.”

And the problem is what exactly?  What did Tavis say that wasn't true?  According to an article in the New York Times, President Obama met with 5 of his closest (unnamed) advisers on Thursday evening who told him it was time for him to say something. My question is why did they have to tell him it was time to say something?  He didn't know?

Those who don't read the Washington Post weren't aware of the calls for President Obama to speak out from prominent African Americans.

In the wake of the not-guilty verdict in the George Zimmerman trial, President Obama has called on the American people to engage in calm reflection. Few expected the president to denounce the verdict or call upon people to take to the streets in protest, but we did expect him to speak in a way that touched the heartbreak, despair and quiet rage that so many of us feel at this moment.
On multiple occasions, Obama has asked blacks to understand the high wire he is forced to walk on the subject of race. He has pleaded that we cut him some slack. Most have done so even as conditions in the black community have become more desperate.

You won't hear writers like Cortland Maloy on TeeVee saying things like this:

In the never-ending cycle of pleas, protests and prayers over recurring injustice, we’re again approaching the quiet times. Put down the signs. Take off the hoodies. Remove the empty bags of Skittles taped over your mouths. Go in for some “calm reflection,” as President Obama put it in a statement following Saturday night’s miscarriage of justice.

The white, male, dominated media forced President Obama to walk a tight rope on race, they molded him into their vision of how the first African American President of the United States of America should act/talk/think/govern.

 I believe some whites were actually afraid President Obama was going to exact some kind of revenge for slavery and Jim Crow. So, in their zeal to shape the first African American President in their image, they turned him into a token with no power. Someone they could point to and say America is post racial. As if the emasculation of black men in America needed more assistance.

From forcing PBO to throw Rev. Jeremiah Wright under the bus because he preached truth to power, to making him host a beer summit instead of a discussion about racial profiling,  to toning down Attorney Eric Holders' Americans are cowards when it comes to discussing issues of race remarks, the mainstream media enabled the first black President to be the President of everybody but black folks. 

When folks like Tavis Smiley, Cornell West, Glen Ford and others tried to sound the alarm, they were called F-king retarded and the Professional Left (like that was a bad thing) which allowed them to be marginalized and  legitimate concerns/issues to be minimized.

I said it before and I will say it again, President Obama needs to fire everybody except Michelle.

I never believed Obama was going to be the the black people's President and only the the black people's President, because I believed him when he said there were no red states or blue states but the United States of America. But, his advisers were so afraid that if he showed any sympathy or empathy to the plight of blacks it would look like he was giving blacks "special treatment".

If  Barack Hussen Obama didn't have the title of President of the United States in front of his name, he could  also be, Sean Bell, Oscar Grant, Jordan Russell, The Jena Six , and so on, and so on.......

On Friday, Obama used the words “black” or “African American” 17 times, and the word “white” only once. At times, the president appeared to be the Explainer-in-Chief, clarifying for white folks a history and legacy that they, too, share—but in drastically different ways, and usually as benefit. Yet, by not specifically addressing this audience, by silencing whiteness and choosing to center again and again on black young men, Obama gave whiteness a pass. He gave it power by masking it, and making it silent.
While he warned black folks against violence, which he said would dishonor Trayvon Martin, he remained silent about the little violence we do know about—when a white woman attacked 73-year-old R&B legend Lester Chambers following the verdict. And rather than convening a national conversation about race—which would might mean having frank conversation about white supremacy and privilege, Obama talked about his daughters. Yes, Malia, Sasha and their friends are different, but that’s likely due to their security detail, and to the fact that they live in a world that most black schoolgirls simply do not.

I HOPE President Obama's surprise comments made white people understand what it means to be black in America, but unless he stops letting the white, male, dominated media frame the debate there is no HOPE for CHANGE  African Americans or anyone else for that matter,  can believe in.