Connie Rice interviewed hundreds of cops .... she was on NPR this morning

[heaven05]

32. there is something

I don't trust in this interview about the 'panic' and 'fear' of white cops for "hulking" black males. Could those hulks be like maybe Eric Garner or Michael Brown?. Is another word for that hulk, "demon"?. Whether civil rights attorney or not, the slant of ms. Rice seems to miss the hate and the racism already present in that white cop that is agitated by racist media, both radio and television, that these cops watch and listen to consistently. I am sure that she is being truthful about some white cops "not having a racist bone in their body", "adopting black children" and "going to black churches". "They really weren't overtly racist". "They weren't consciously racist". Okay maybe true again and again, nationwide. But I ask, in a town like ferguson, how many white cops did what ms. Rice used as positive examples of "nonracist white cops"? I found no examples like that mentioned anywhere in the last 4+months concerning the multitude of shooting/executions and murders of UNARMED black males and females? Could any of those cops in NYC that surrounded Eric Garner be an example of what ms. Rice said? Was that cop that shot 12 year old Tamir Rice an example of what ms. Rice used as a "fearful" cop? Definitely yes given that he was fired from another police department as "unfit for a police officer". In the former example given stated by ms. Rice, I truly doubt it given the the circumstances of those two black men and their death. Racism IS part of the mindset of MANY white cops, period. No amount of soft peddling their state of mind is ever going to change that fact.

Black men fear white cops and white cops fear black men according to ms. Rice and her analysis because of mistrust by one, with good reason, and by the other because they know, even if they are not racist, another cop that is consciously racist and acts on that racism with the black man this "non racist" white cop is facing. If that creates the fear to shoot first, then ask questions later while spinning the truth in the non racist white cop, then the training and psychological screening that the racist cop somehow got through is the problem. How do you screen an individual that when asked by a trainer, "what do you think of black people? And that individual, while having the nword screaming in their mind answers, "oh I have no problem with black people, I even have some as friends". How do we stop a justice system that racist. How do we rectify a police institution that is racist? By sending all racist police officers to a black housing project? I don't think so. Ms. Rice seems to be ignoring a lot of the reality of american culture and society or just outright discounting and dismissing that reality. Better training and realistic psychological screening is the only answer.

To panic and fear black men in situations where the police person is facing a hostile and/or peaceful black person seems to show me that first:the wrong type of person is doing policing. second: the training of these police persons is inadequate.

I just have a problem here with ms. Rice soft peddling racism as fear and panic. It is obvious and transparently true, racist hate causes a lot of brutality and summary execution(s) faced by unarmed black men, women and children from white cops.

Ms. Rice says in her soft peddling of the summary executions and outright murders that "the black community experiences it (the executions) as racism". No doubt about it when that is the motivation most obvious for the killing an unarmed black person by the white cop(s).

Don't misunderstand me. I hope ms. Rices 'model can be adopted as a nationwide training tool, yet I know that for some white cops facing unarmed black males, women and children, "fear and panic" is NOT why they kill. I hope her training in community relations, Public Trust Policing, results in less murders and executions of young and old black males, females and children in her immediate AO and if it results in less racist attitudes by the white cop(s), better screening and training, then it's all to the good. I'm not going to hold my breath for more ACCOUNTABILITY being accepted by police departments, for the suspicious and/or controversial shootings of unarmed people, or the DA's and GJ..