The Criminal Punishment System: A Product of Systemic Racism

It took me a lot longer than I would like to admit to calm down enough to write this post. My emotions ranged from anger, sadness, anxiety and, ultimately, clairvoyance.

Just to be clear, I was not surprised in the least bit by the grand jury’s decision in Eric Garner’s murder. I was not surprised by the murder of Tamir Rice…Akai Gurley…and quite honestly I will not be surprised when the next black or brown man, woman, boy or girl is killed by law enforcement.

What I am angry about is the fact that many people continue to believe if there was an indictment this would in some way validate the criminal justice system, despite its historic lopsided distribution of justice.

The sanctioned death of Eric Garner is a clear sign there are unaddressed systemic racist issues that if left ineffectively and non-extensively unaddressed on an ongoing basis there will continue to be men and women of color who will be brutalized and killed by law enforcement. That is the hard-hitting truth, but nevertheless, it is truth.

The Criminal Punishment System

The U.S.’s history of exploiting and throwing away of persons with colored skin has and continues to haunt us in circumstances like Eric Garner. The viciousness employed by NYPD Officer Daniel Pantaleo comes from sanctioned encouragement of violence towards people of color.

This is not unique to the NYPD, Ferguson, LAPD, Houston, etc. Police brutality and murder is a reflection of this country’s history of genocide of the indigenous people, chattel slavery, segregation, a felonious “War on Drugs”, and an all-out assault on people of color dating back to its forefathers.

For those who say that law enforcement in general is too violent, I present to you, as Malik el-Hajj Shabazz a.k.a. Malcolm X stated, the clean glass of water to examine.

The police capture of suspected white serial killers Jared Loughner, James Holmes, Israel Keyes, and many others, proves that law enforcement has the ability to practice restraint even when dealing with suspected, and in some cases confirmed violent suspects.

However, when it comes to people of color that restraint is ingrained historically, not police departmentally, to be non-existent.

The violence perpetrated against people of color stems from the belief that people of color are inherently violent and, therefore, preemptive violence is warranted.

A recent study published by the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, tested and proved, among other disturbing facts, that Black boys are seen as less “childlike” than their White peers, more responsible for their actions and therefore are more appropriate targets for police violence.

A fact manifested in the heavily publicized deaths of Trayvon Martin and Ramarley Graham both of whom were unarmed when engaged in what ultimately led to be their deaths.

Therefore, even if Darren Wilson and Daniel Pantaleo were indicted, what does that mean? For sure, it does not mean that the culture in law enforcement has changed. What if NYPD officers start wearing body cameras? That does not mean the culture of discrimination within the NYPD will change. And it does not mean that the criminal justice system is less racist than it was previous to the deaths of Mike Brown and Eric Garner. This is the reality:

According to a NAACP Criminal Justice Fact Sheet:

• African Americans now constitute nearly 1 million of the total 2.3 million incarcerated population
• African Americans are incarcerated at nearly six times the rate of whites
• Together, African American and Hispanics comprised 58% of all prisoners in 2008, even though African Americans and Hispanics make up approximately one quarter of the US population
• 1 in 100 African American women are in prison
• 5 times as many Whites are using drugs as African Americans, yet African Americans are sent to prison for drug offenses at 10 times the rate of Whites
• African Americans serve virtually as much time in prison for a drug offense (58.7 months) as whites do for a violent offense (61.7 months). (Sentencing Project)

The criminal justice system and by extension the police department are both existing by their culture and norms. The belief that people of color are dangerous, criminal and bad is what has caused us to have to mourn the deaths of so many young black men and women of color.

Until we all realize that one or one-hundred indictments would not make a difference, that body cameras are not the answer and that there are racist origins that are intertwined with the execution of “justice” from an unjust system, then we still have a mountain to cross.