Chris Cuomo: Police reform won't happen until 'white people's kids start getting killed'

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

CNN's Chris Cuomo claimed late Friday that substantial changes to policing in America would come only when "white people's kids start getting killed."

During a segment on his show, Cuomo lashed out at white Americans who have resisted calls for police to face accountability, particularly those who have sought to justify the shootings of 13-year-old Adam Toledo in Chicago and others who have died at the hands of police, exclaiming, "Shootings? Gun laws? Access to weapons? Your kids start getting killed? White people's kids start getting killed?"

"Those start piling up," he added, and people will ask, "What is going on with these police?"

His remarks came following days of protests in Minnesota and Chicago over the deaths of Daunte Wright last Sunday and Toledo in March, which was captured on body camera footage released last week that revealed that Toledo appeared to be surrendering when he was fatally shot by an officer.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/chris-cuomo-police-reform-wont-happen-until-white-peoples-kids-start-getting-killed/ar-BB1fMqXY

I'm sure that remark stirred some shit up. Not that he's woring.

[SoonerPride]

1. Well that won't happen

So change won’t happen

And he’s not wrong at all

[Sugarcoated]

119. It does happen

and it will escalate. Power corrupts.

[Haggard Celine]

2. White people, including kids, have gotten killed by cops

all along. It doesn't get much attention, though. If there's going to be any police reform, it's going to be important to mention that the lack of accountability affects everyone who comes into contact with police. Because as soon as people say that cops are racist, somebody points out instances where white people get killed and the whole discussion becomes about race rather than about the police's lack of accountability. It's got to be shown how the problem affects everybody or we'll always get back to the racial tit for tat.

[WarGamer]

44. Of course...

[Demsrule86]

55. I think it will happen...already beginning in the lower economic areas...there have

been some no knocks warrant gone bad and just harassments...my Dad told me when he was a kid drugs were already a thing in the Black neighborhoods...but no one care until it hit the white areas and affected their kids. He was from Chicago.

This is an American problem the police need to given guidance and rules to police by...and I believe tried in federal court for abuses...and police brutality and abuse will undoubtedly start happening to White folks. It will begin in the poor neighborhoods first. and I think already is at the beginning states as I said before.

[intheflow]

82. White kids/people aren't specifically profiled for their skin color, and

white killings-by-cops happen at a much lower percentage rate than cops killing BIPOC. Knowing the facts debunks that racist talking point. Remember: white privilege doesn't mean your life has been easy, it means it hasn't been made harder by your skin color.

But maybe you'll understand it better coming from the National Academy of Sciences:

Risk of being killed by police use of force in the United States by age, race–ethnicity, and sex, 2019
https://pnas.org/content/116/34/16793

[Haggard Celine]

93. Oh, thanks for the source and everything!

I had no idea that black people were getting killed at a higher rate than white people. I didn't know racism existed, either. I guess I need to read more of your posts so I can learn lots more interesting facts.

[intheflow]

104. Wow, what a snotty response.

When DU was young, we always asked for sources to back up claims. People that mock verifiable sources perpetuate the "fake news"/"alternate facts" universe. And you obviously don't know that Black people are getting killed at higher rates than whites or you wouldn't be spewing this bullshit talking point.

Meanwhile, I'm a librarian and am happy to give you many more sources so you can actually stick up for Black people being murdered by cops instead of rolling over for the racists who push this "but white people!" like, "Oh, well. That's just the way it is!"

Northeastern University:
THE RESEARCH IS CLEAR: WHITE PEOPLE ARE NOT MORE LIKELY THAN BLACK PEOPLE TO BE KILLED BY POLICE.
https://news.northeastern.edu/2020/07/16/the-research-is-clear-white-people-are-not-more-likely-than-black-people-to-be-killed-by-police/

Harvard School of Public Health:
Black people more than three times as likely as white people to be killed during a police encounter
https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/hsph-in-the-news/blacks-whites-police-deaths-disparity/

WaPo:
Aren’t more white people than black people killed by police? Yes, but no.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2016/07/11/arent-more-white-people-than-black-people-killed-by-police-yes-but-no/

And louder for you, because this talking point puts you in shitty company:
NY Times:
Asked About Black Americans Killed by Police, Trump Says, ‘So Are White People’
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/14/us/politics/trump-white-people-killed-by-police.html

*Edited b/c typos.

[Haggard Celine]

106. Good for you.

You're doing great work! You've changed my life.

[StarfishSaver]

112. Some people appreciate learning new things

And even for those who don't, a simple "thank you for the information" - or even just silence - is quite sufficient.

[Haggard Celine]

113. Okay, "thank you for the information.". Happy?

[Baked Potato]

3. Since Cuomo tied the police "reform" issue in with "gun laws," I will add

that until RICH people greatly suffer from gun violence, gun reform will not be a priority.

Workplace massacres, school shootings, and shootings where regular folk work and shop are the big danger areas for mass shootings.

I really thought after the Las Vegas mass shooting there would be something big done, but I was wrong there.

[cinematicdiversions]

8. Well according to Chris is was only minorities at the country and western concert on the strip. NT

[Bettie]

102. Was that a police killing?

Weird, because I thought it was an armed gun nut killing indiscriminately.

Totally different types of murders.

[JI7]

12. Many of the school shootings have happened in well to do areas

where the kids are mostly from pretty financially well off families.

[Baked Potato]

15. I was working from memory, here is an up-to-date mass shooting listing:

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/12/mass-shootings-mother-jones-full-data/

It’s actually hard to look at all the shootings. Out of the school shootings, I will take your word the shootings affected well off families too. And, of course I realize their children are precious lives too.

[JI7]

16. It's not really an issue of wealth . Rural whites that vote Republican

in huge numbers are more likely to oppose any gun control than white people who are better off.

[Baked Potato]

19. I see your point and appreciate your discussion, thanks.

[JI7]

20. No problem, there is money behind it

but it's more the gun manufacturers and lobbying groups like the NRA.

But it's mostly becsuse of the opposition from rural whites who elect republicans to Congress that we are unable to get much done.

[onecaliberal]

4. White 4 and 5 year old children were killed in Newtown.

Nothing was done.

[StarfishSaver]

22. He's not talking about gun violence and gun control

He's talking about police brutality and killings. A different issue.

[kcr]

98. It is a related issue

Both are issues where guns are involved. I think the fact that white kids dying did nothing to change the issue of gun violence might be an indicator of what it could do for police brutality.

[StarfishSaver]

101. The issue isn't limited to guns

Police kill sometimes kill Black and Brown people with guns. They also kill them with cars, chokeholds, batons, hands, knees and other ways. And this isn't just about killing minorities. Police reform is about changing practices that unfairly profile, target, abuse, discriminate against minority individuals and communities.

Trying to morph and subsume this into the unrelated problem of mass shootings Is a distraction and a dodge. The two issues are completely separate.

[kcr]

115. I don't think anyone is trying to do that

I think you're reading intent that isn't there. I fully agree with everything you say regarding the issues with the police. Where I disagree is with the trope about things getting done when they happen to white people. Disagreeing with that isn't an attempt to deflect or deny. I fully believe that white people will ignore systemic problems even if it means suffering collateral damage to their own, and this is particularly true if it's a problem that primarily affects POC. This is why nothing was done after Sandy Hook. White American conservative culture is individualistic.

[StarfishSaver]

116. Police violence is not the same as gun violence by random strangers

You can bet that if enough white people thought the government officials they pay to protect them were disproportionately targeting and harming them and their children, you can bet they would start holding them to account. We'd be talking about "cancel culture" on steroids.

[kcr]

117. Once again. I'm not saying that.

I'm thinking there's no point in responding.

[LanternWaste]

27. You do realize the difference between a statistical standard and an aberration, yes?

These go-to, fallacious false equivalencies trotted out to rationalize the irrational get really old, man...

[JI7]

5. White kids have been killed in school shootings and we haven't done

anything about gun control.

[LisaL]

7. Yep.

Haven't done a thing.

[intheflow]

105. White kids killed in schools are not killed by police.

Cuomo is talking about police reform, not gun reform.

[cinematicdiversions]

6. My God this is a horrible take.

Almost all school shootings have involved white children, Chris. From Columbine forward.

Is he trying to win back his stupidest brother trophy?

[LisaL]

9. I don't know what he wants, but what he said was awful.

And wrong.
Like has already been pointed out, we haven' done anything to stop school shootings or mass shootings.

[Bucky]

57. It does come off as a Swiftian policy proposal

But I bet it sounds less loony if you put it in context of what else he was talking about at the moment

[OneGrassRoot]

69. Wasn't he specifying police -- not mass shooters? n/t

[cinematicdiversions]

71. Possibly but even then it is a horrible take

While it is true that white children being killed by police is a local story rather than a national one he certainly should know what the raw numbers are.

Sorry very tone deaf response.

[StarfishSaver]

75. Speaking of tone deaf responses

Yours is noted.

[markie]

10. white senator's kids n/t

[WhiskeyGrinder]

11. White supremacist institutions hurt white people too. White people just tend to accept it, as long

as marginalized people are hurt more.

[uponit7771]

13. K&R, sorta like crack vs opioids

[Hortensis]

14. If so Cuomo owes thousands of dead young people and those who

love them abject apologies. I don't believe for a moment that he doesn't know nearly as many or more young white guys have always been killed than all the others put together -- not more per capita of course, but more in absolute numbers because they're such a large majority. To pretend their deaths don't exist, to believe they don't matter are both completely despicable.

[StarfishSaver]

23. I suggest you and others here read what he said and pay attention to what he's talking about

He's not talking about gun violence, mass shootings, etc. He's talking about police shootings. That's a completely different issue.

And he's absolutely right.

[LisaL]

28. He is quoted as exlaiming

Shootings, gun laws, and so on.

[StarfishSaver]

31. Really?

CNN's Chris Cuomo claimed late Friday that substantial changes to policing in America would come only when "white people's kids start getting killed."

During a segment on his show, Cuomo lashed out at white Americans who have resisted calls for police to face accountability, particularly those who have sought to justify the shootings of 13-year-old Adam Toledo in Chicago and others who have died at the hands of police, exclaiming, "Shootings? Gun laws? Access to weapons? Your kids start getting killed? White people's kids start getting killed?"

"Those start piling up," he added, and people will ask, "What is going on with these police?"

It's obvious he's talking about police killings, not gun violence in general. And he's right about too many white people resisting calls for police reform and that they would feel differently if it was their kids being killed by the police.

[LisaL]

48. So if white kids dying from gun violence did nothing to curb such violence,

his claim still doesn't hold any water, even if he was only talking about police killings.

[MerryBlooms]

51. After reading through the responses to this... I can't even believe what I'm reading.

I totally get why you gave up and disappeared. God bless you for still pounding your head against white brick walls. Your words still mean a lot to me. I thank you. Take care.

[cinematicdiversions]

62. But many more white kids are killed in police shootings

I understand as a percentage of the population black children are over represented, but the actual numbers simply do not support his statement in any way.

[StarfishSaver]

63. Oh, please

The proportionality is everything

White people generally are NOT concerned about this issue - or at least are not concerned enough - because they don't see it impacting them in any real way. Too many white pepe also believe - as we see right here on DU - that these killings ar isolated, justified and usually deserved. If the numbers were larger and as out of proportion as they are for Black people, they would indeed feel differently.

[Scrivener7]

87. What makes you think more white kids are killed in police shootings? Even in raw numbers.

Where are you getting that?

About twice the number of white PEOPLE are shot by cops each year as black people. While white people make up 72% of the population while 13% are black.

But where are you getting the idea that more white KIDS are killed in police shootings than black kids?

This article says a black child is 6x MORE LIKELY TO BE KILLED BY THE POLICE.
https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/17/us/black-children-police-brutality-trnd/index.html

There are about 5.5 times more white people than black people in the USA.

That means that EVEN IN RAW NUMBERS AND NOT PERCENTAGES more black kids are killed by police than white kids. And again, white people are 72% of the population and black people are 13% of the population.

So the actual numbers do not support YOUR statement in any way.

[OneGrassRoot]

70. People sure do conflate a lot of stuff to distract here these days. +1 to what you said. n/t

[marie999]

17. Statista-457 white people killed by cops in 2020.

[Scrivener7]

84. Statista - 241 black people were killed by cops in 2020. Black people are 13% of the population.

White people are 72% of the population.

I'm not seeing any kind of comparison there that says we white people are targeted by cops anything like the way black people are. I'm also not seeing any stories of white people being shot by cops while they sit in their living rooms, because they did not signal a turn correctly, taking out the garbage, selling loosie cigarettes or any of the other scores of daily chores and activities that black people get killed for.

Are you??

If not, what is your damn point?

[marie999]

86. You are a very rude person.

Did you not understand what Chris Cuomo said? My post was strictly in response to what he said. Now apologize to me.

[Scrivener7]

88. Lol. Hope you aren't holding your breath. And no, your post really isn't responding to what

Cuomo said at all.

Seriously, that is hilarious.

[marie999]

90. I don't care if they kick me off,

you are a miserable person and don't bother responding because I won't be able to see it. You should take some classes in reading comprehension. Goodbye.

[Scrivener7]

91. LOL! You are killing me here.

[intheflow]

107. Wow, YOU"RE a very rude person!

And so interesting that you went from responding to a post to name-calling, and then demanded an apology like you're royalty or something. Geesh, this thread!

[Renew Deal]

18. I'm not convinced that's true for one reason...

That the law and order types aren't just about race but authoritarianism. So they will argue the police are always right and ask what people did to deserve it.

[Caliman73]

94. I don't think that he articulated it very well.

He should have said that if middle class White kids were being killed at the same proportion as young Black people, there would be such an outcry, that changes in policing would be much more likely.

I do think that there is validity to what you are saying regarding race and authoritarianism, however, there is a far greater assumption that Black people are dangerous, and are asking for what they get, than White kids. The statistics show that Black kids are 3 to 6 times more likely to be killed by police. That is a huge number when you consider what that would mean. Someone posted that 457 White people were killed by police in 2020, a slow year because of the pandemic. If you take that and put it through the multiplier for likelihood for Black kids, that would be between 1,371 and 2,742 White people dying at the hands of police.

Police certainly get the benefit of the doubt in many cases, but if your victims start coming from more affluent backgrounds with more visibility, then the issue would have more legs.

[BlueLucy]

21. unarmed White man in his 40's shot by cop in Portland

just 2 days ago.

[StarfishSaver]

24. Well then that means police killings of black people is not a problem.

Just like the fact that sometimes men get raped means that rape is not a serious problem for women ...

No one has claimed that white people aren't sometimes killed by the police. The issue is the fact that black people are exponentially more likely to be killed by the police than white people are. Don't play the "a white person got shot by police so what's the problem" gaslight game.

Oh, and by the way - that white man in Portland wasn't unarmed.

https://www.kptv.com/news/police-identify-man-shot-and-killed-in-lents-park-officer-involved-shooting/article_620f42ca-9ed7-11eb-82ea-6719e1827d3e.html

[WarGamer]

45. I think it means that police, in general...

tend to be bullies and use lethal force too quickly, even it it's within their legal right.

[StarfishSaver]

53. If it were simply that, they'd be killing whites at the same rate they're killing Black and Brown

people. But they're not.

You can't look at these alarmingly disproportional numbers and pretend that race has nothing to do with it.

[intheflow]

108. Apparently, waaay too many DUers can indeed

"look at these alarmingly disproportional numbers and pretend that race has nothing to do with it." This is the most willfully obtuse and disheartening thread I've read on DU in a long time. smdh

[StarfishSaver]

114. People's true colors often come out when they least expect it

And they don't even realize it.

[Celerity]

25. I do not see much being done even if the numbers of whites shot increase 5, 10 fold. The 2nd

Amendment, as interpreted by a RW SCOTUS, is a suicide pact. The genie cannot be put back in the bottle until we take back the SCOTUS with activist, sane justices. Then comes the truly deadly task of rolling back the guns. It will likely escalate into a series of regional, hopefully isolated and containable shooting skirmishes I fear. It's a gun-humper world, and all the people living in the US just are along for the ride.

Yes, I am that jaded.

[Scrivener7]

26. WTF is up with the responses in this thread?

All about how police shoot white people too. Are we really going down that stupid road? What is this, OAN?

[LisaL]

29. Who died and made you king?

NT

[Scrivener7]

30. Lol. I guess that means you disapprove of my comment. To which I would say,

Who died and made YOU king?

[StarfishSaver]

34. Lol

[Bucky]

59. That comment is in poor taste since Prince Philip just died

I'm just kidding. I was trying to say something as irrelevant as you just did

[Caliman73]

95. What!?! ... Did the police get him? Something has to be done!

[Bucky]

110. Actually that'd make a pretty good spy movie

Prince Philip, 99, fakes his own death so he can go underground and prove his innocence. Think The Bourne Identity meets Going in Style.

Starring Norman Lloyd as Philip, Maggie Smith as the love interest, and Michael Caine as "The Kid"

[Caliman73]

111. Bravo!

I'd watch it!

[USALiberal]

74. Grumpy? Nt

[StarfishSaver]

32. You're surprised

That's a common response to any discussion about race around here.

[Scrivener7]

35. Just totally bizarre, though, that it seems accompanied by a willful misinterpretation of the OP.

[StarfishSaver]

36. IKR?

Cuomo was obviously talking about police killings of black people, but that didn't stop people from hijacking the thread to insist that white people sometimes get shot, too - and what about all those white people killed by mass shooters?!

This is a typical scenario - any discussion not centered on white folk draws this kind of fire.

[Scrivener7]

40. I'm white, and this seems to me to be happening more often now than I ever noticed

before.

Is that because I was not as aware of it before, or has it increased lately?

[StarfishSaver]

42. I don't think it's happening more often

It's just that cell phone cameras and body cams are documenting it. Black and Brown folk have been calling this out for years but have been ignored, dismissed, and gaslighted - and cops claims were believed. Cameras are making a difference.

As Will Smith said, it's not happening more, it's just being filmed.

[Scrivener7]

60. No, I know that. I mean this hijacking of the conversations about it. What you were

describing: the need for white people, even in a liberal space like this, to make it, completely illogically, about ourselves. This thread feels like a republiQan ladies book club meeting.

[intheflow]

109. +1000. White people centering this discussion on white people.

SO mighty white of DU. Very disheartening.

[intheflow]

83. Agree 100%.

We finally get a cis white male with privilege up the wazoo to channel Ella Baker and THIS is the response from liberal DU?


?itok=Be3yiW-P

[kcr]

118. But Ella Baker isn't really saying the same thing

Ella Baker is correctly saying that the killing of Black people isn't as important to White people. What Cuomo is saying is that more bad things happening to White people would make White people care more about the things that are happening to Black people. I don't think that's the case. They would only care that other White people are getting treated badly, and it's still no guarantee they'd actually do anything about it. They may still believe that authoritarian-style law and order is more important. Like I said in another post, white America, particularly conservative white America, is individualistic. They don't look at things from a systemic point of view. The police aren't racist anymore, they're just treating everybody like shit? Okay with them. The streets are safer.

[True Dough]

33. Related...

[StarfishSaver]

37. Not really

He's not talking about mass shootings. He's talking about police killing Black and Brown people and the refusal of many white people to support calls for reform that can prevent them.

Mass shootings are a different issue unrelated to his point.

[MerryBlooms]

50. How many of those mass shootings were cop related? None. Not Related.

[betsuni]

38. Until YouTube has hundreds examples of white people filming interactions with police

ending in unnecessary arrest/violence/death.

[FakeNoose]

39. I take exception to this statement

Chris Cuomo doesn't speak for me, and maybe not for most of us on DU. We believe that ALL lives matter. We believe that BLACK lives matter yes - because they are a subset of ALL lives.

When did the municipal police departments in this country become our judges, our juries and our executioners? Never - it has never happened. We still live by the rule of law, and the police departments need to understand this. They must follow the same rules we all follow.

Chris Cuomo might have a group of fans who believe a certain way, I wouldn't know. We need to make sure that our mayors and our police chiefs understand that they are elected by voters who are going to hold THEM responsible. We're going to expect THEM to answer for the misdeeds of the police who are undertrained or incorrectly chosen for a job they shouldn't be doing. The Mayor, the Police Chief, the DA and other elected officials WILL answer and take responsibility!

[Scrivener7]

41. Good God. Seriously??

[WarGamer]

47. Why can't each post have a "rec" button?

[electric_blue68]

43. Isn't it more like C Cuomo is...

... saying when white kids are shot for no reason in a
police interaction the way too many black people (usually men & teens) have been for more than decades - then white people will demand that police culture changes.

[Scrivener7]

61. Yes! Obviously it is! And yet this thread is full of replies about "all lives matter" and

white school shootings.

Are we white people so unable to look at the problem that we have to morph into spewers of republican mottos when we see a conversation about the random and rampant shootings of black people by cops? Even in liberal spaces like DU?

I'm horrified by this thread.

[Caliman73]

96. It is. He just said it in an inarticulate way.

Too easy to be misinterpreted by people who want to misinterpret it.

If White kids from more affluent backgrounds started to be killed in the types of police interactions that these Black people have been killed in recently and in the past. If they were killed for seemingly no reason and in the same proportion as Black people have, then there would be such an outcry for reform of the systems of policing.

Black people have always been portrayed as deserving recipients of the problems they are subjected to. Something about the race that just brings problems upon itself. People aren't too keen on looking inward and examining the attitudes from themselves that creates the situation where Black kids and young men are seen as inherently dangerous and in need of "stern" policing.

I know that these are anecdotes and not indicative of a larger picture, but they stand out. A young Black man picked up an air rifle at Walmart and people freaked out, called the cops, and the young Black man ended up dead. Two White young men not only picked up an air rifle at Walmart, but were actively shooting at people in the store. They were apprehended alive and well. Similarly you have the story of the 12 year old in Chicago who was killed at the playground less than 30 seconds after police arrived and the young Latino kid who was killed in California with the replica gun with the orange tip. Then you have the man in his 60's walking around with a loaded AR-15, drunk and belligerent, threatening police and they took an hour and 45 minutes to talk him down.

[Mz Pip]

46. Sandy Hook

was White people’s kids.

That didn’t do squat for gun control.

[WarGamer]

49. Nearly every "Newspaper Headline" Mass shooting was majority white victims...

Pulse, Borderline, MSD, Columbine, Vegas etc etc etc...

[Bucky]

58. That's changing the subject a bit

Since police shootings is not really about gun control

[BGBD]

52. The police DO shoot a lot of white people

Each year the police kill somewhere in the neighborhood of 400-500 white people by gunshot. It varies, but that's often more than every other race combined. Non-white races are shot in numbers disproportionate to their share of the population, but it's disingenuous to suggest that white people aren't being killed in huge numbers by the police annually.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/585152/people-shot-to-death-by-us-police-by-race/

The same excessive force and corruption can be levied in many of these shootings such as:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Zachary_Hammond or this more recent example where a 13 year old boy with Asperger's was shot 11 times and (miraculously) survived, although he's left with limited use of his hand and neuropathy throughout his body. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Linden_Cameron

So yeah, white peoples kids are being shot and killed, but that doesn't seem to be moving the needle either.

[StarfishSaver]

54. If white people's kids were shot by police at a rate of 3 times their proportion of the population

this would be a different story.

And if they were being shot by Black cops in those numbers, it would be a national crisis.

[uponit7771]

56. +1, "shot by Black cops in those numbers" ... This is what Cuomo should've said but prolly doesn't

... feel he has the room among decision makers who are most likely white themselves

[StarfishSaver]

66. Bullshit

But I'm sure there are plenty of folks who appreciate this favorite talking point of right wing racism apologists being spread on a Democratic website.

[BGBD]

68. K

Everything I said is true. You don't benefit from living in an echo chamber.

[dsc]

64. I thought that was true in regards to gun safety

then the school shootings started, almost entirely at white schools, and nothing changed. Maybe this would be different, but I was sure it would be in regards to gun safety and we saw how that went.

[StarfishSaver]

67. This is not a gun safety issue

It's a completely separate issue.

[dsc]

76. I am not saying the issues are the same

but if having 5 year old white children mowed down two weeks before Christmas didn't move the needle on guns then I fail to see having teen aged white children moving the needle here. I could be wrong, but I really doubt it.

[StarfishSaver]

79. Most white people in the country aren't affected by murders of people killed in mass shootings

They are too far away and too unconnected. And they don't feel that kind of fun violence will ever touch them.

But if white kids were being harassed, assaulted, abused and killed by police across the country in the proportions to their population that Black and Brown people are, many if them would feel very differently.

We saw exactly how this works when it came to the crack "epidemic" and the opioid "crisis."

[malaise]

72. White people with connections or even black people with connections

When that police woman shot Botham Jean (a very well connected man from St Lucia) in his own home, his family had enough connections to get that cop charged. He also worked with a prestigious international firm. She was found guilty.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Botham_Jean

[Caliman73]

97. True. Thing is, who is more likely to have "connections" and resources.

I don't think that if there were a spate of police shootings of young White people in Appalachia, that we would see an outcry, but if middle class and upper middle class White kids started getting killed for no seemingly good reason, we would see things start to change.

[malaise]

100. You nailed it

but if middle class and upper middle class White kids started getting killed for no seemingly good reason, we would see things start to change.

or if cops were called on white professors in their own homes, etc., etc.

[malaise]

73. White people with connections or even black people with connections

When that police woman shot Botham Jean (a very well connected man from St Lucia) in his own home, his family had enough connections to get that cop charged. He also worked with a prestigious international firm. She was found guilty.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Botham_Jean

[ecstatic]

77. What a lot of people here don't seem to get

It's not just about the wildly disproportionate killing of unarmed black people, it's the entire dynamic of how policing is done in this country. The goal of many police departments appears to be the systematic dehumanization, monetization and criminalization of people of color. The tools for accomplishing the mission are frequent police stops featuring excessive force and public humiliation, which may eventually lead to an argument, assault, arrest (or spontaneous execution), incarceration, excessive fines, license suspension, criminal record, etc.

When every white man has multiple stories of how they've been stopped, searched, profiled, humiliated, treated like trash, had a gun pointed at them and was nearly killed by the police, then change could theoretically come, but I happen to think that at that point it would be too late for the entire country. It's the whole "first they came for..." thing.

[Scrivener7]

78. This! This damn thread has cut a big piece out of my faith in humanity. You have put a little back.

I cannot believe what I am reading here. How, in this day and age, do we ALL not know that what you are saying is fact???

[StarfishSaver]

81. Thank you so much for this

It is disgusting and disheartening that you have to explain this - over and over and over - on a Democratic discussion board.

[Caliman73]

99. That was articulated very well.

I would recommend you put that up as a separate thread.

Cuomo, likely because he was angry, did not articulate the situation very well. There is interplay between the entire culture of policing, race, and other factors that has us where we are today. I do think that if the situation of young White people being killed for seemingly no good reason at the same proportion of their population as Black people are killed, we would see a far larger outcry. As you said, it might not be enough, or be too late, but there would definitely be more of a sense of a problem. It certainly would not require months of street level protest to have the issue being addressed.

[Bettie]

103. Well said and thanks for that

I am no longer surprised at the result of these kind of threads, but it makes me sad that even here, people play "what about".

[Treefrog]

85. Toledo wasn't black.

He didn’t look black in the least. How many people here realize that he wasn’t black?

[StarfishSaver]

89. The point is that he wasn't white

[JustAnotherGen]

92. He stole it from Ice-T

Body Count - 1991

You'd know what to do
If your kid got killed on the way to school
Or a cop shot your kid in the back yard
Shit would hit the fan motherfucker and it will hit real hard
I hear it every night, another gun fight
The tension mounts, on with the Body Count


It's still the same

[Politicub]

120. He's not wrong. It's like the opioid epidemic - drug abuse became a public health crisis

when it affected white folks. That's just the truth.

People are getting all high and mighty about criticizing Cuomo, when he was making a salient point. So instead of talking about the point he's trying to make, the internet is awash with people rending their garments as they try to outdo each other about how outraged they feel.

[kcr]

121. It's also the truth

that the discussion of opioids still mostly only revolve around how they affect white people. Meanwhile the war on drugs still disproportionately affects POC. The increased focus really didn't benefit Black people much at all.

[Politicub]

122. I agree - thank you for adding that point. It has gotten worse, if anything, for POC.