Post Racial America

Not really.

EDITED TO ADD: Look at the photo, what could have set the cop off? Must have been that beard, never trust a guy with a goatee.

Recognize the dude in the photo? I do. Before reading the story I was at a loss for his name, but I recognized him.... from things like this:



I might not have known his buddies call him Skip, but I would have remembered him interviewing Spike Lee, being on CNN, I would have just thought, "Hey, it is that intellectual I always see talking about race."

I sure wouldn't have thought "My God, he is breaking into that nice house".

Read the story.

Second best line of the story: "Being a black man is often Kafkaesque"

Best line is a Malcolm X quote, you find that one yourself.

The story basically goes like this. Terrifying black man (read: almost 60, nationally known Harvard academic carrying a cane) attempts to enter house in nice (white) suburban (white) Massachusetts (really white) neighbourhood.

Neighbour (frightened honky) calls cops. Cops show up.

This is where the reports differ. Skip says this:

-- Door got jammed. Gates and his driver go in back door, turn off alarm, and force the front door open.

-- Call the campus housing folks, tell them to fix the damn door.

-- Cops show up.

-- Gates asks, "Can I help you", shows ID and everything, in HIS OWN HOUSE.

-- Officer refuses to give him a badge number or a name.

At that point, Prof Gates may have got a little hot... according to the police report, he said.

"A visibly upset Gates responded to the officer’s assertion that he was responding to a report of a break-in with, “Why, because I’m a black man in America?’’

“Gates then turned to me and told me that I had no idea who I was ‘messing’ with and that I had not heard the last of it,’’ the report said. “While I was led to believe that Gates was lawfully in the residence, I was quite surprised and confused with the behavior he exhibited toward me.

Gates was eventually arrested for shouting at the officer.

Not for a B&E on his own house, but for having the teremity to question the officer who wouldn't even give him his badge number, and if you are dealing with the police, get a badge number and a name, otherwise, they are very accomplished at closing ranks.

I would have shouted.... real loud and real long. Probably would have swore, made some comments about the level of training and academic capability of city police officers, and I still wouldn't have been arrested.

OK, he did work in some choice material,

When the officer repeatedly told Gates he would speak with him outside, the normally mild-mannered professor shouted, “Ya, I’ll speak with your mama outside,’’ according to the report.

Since when is it a crime to be rude? Or to makes remarks about someone's mama? Not very dignified, but hardly arrest worthy.

Racism II

Inspired by the comments over Racism I, here is Part II.

Lots of people say that they see it everywhere in the territory. When you see it, now you know what to do. Write it up as a completely blind item, and post it on your blog. Let's see how far this goes.

There is a particular restaurant, in an unnamed location in this territory of 85 per cent Inuit people, where one of the staff members only waits on white people.

It is unbelievable, this person is in the position where they get to pick their own tables, and without fail, only white folks are at their table.

I don't know if it is a perception over tips, attitudes or just plain old bigotry, but that is what happens.

A person who decides who they will wait on, based only on their ethnic make-up, that is racist. And yes, I've seen it with my own eyes, too many times.

Racism I

From now on, when I see an instance of racism, I plan to tell you about it. Sadly, for Iqaluit, I don't think that Racism I will be the only one, just one in a series of ugly vignettes, and they are all true.

Here is the first one:

An Inuit woman gets into a cab, that already has another passenger. That is the way the cabs work here BTW, anyone can get into anyone elses cab. Think small buses, that go where you want them to.

She forgets her bank card, and tells the driver, "Can we go back to get it, you can charge me for the extra stop."

The driver obliges, because, you know, people forget their bank cards and he wants to get paid. The white woman who was already in the cab was not as kind.

They get to the bank, and she starts by saying, "You know, she is going to run off. She'll never pay you." When she comes back, money in hand, she is still going on, "Wow, what a surprise, you are going to get paid."

Making a determination that someone is not going to pay your cabbie, based on nothing but the ethnicity of the person who is supposed to pay, that is racism.

I don't know if that makes her a racist, but that is a racist statement.