I stepped away from this blog about 3 years ago, without any fanfare. I always had an intention to return, but life got in the way. Then the pandemic hit, and even though that should've meant more time available, it didn't.
I still have lots to say, and plenty of updates on what I've been up to the last 3 years. (Spoiler alert: a LOT.) For today, however, I wanted to relate a story about something that happened over the weekend.
Michelle and I were out running errands last Saturday. We're having a local runoff election here in Plano, and our usual voting center at Collin College was open, so we stopped by to cast a ballot. As we pulled into the designated parking area for the election, we became aware of a large number of police cars (a total of eight, we later counted) parked a few rows away, some with lights flashing. And several officers--all White--were talking with a Black woman and (presumably) her teenage daughter.
We had a lot to do that day--my cousin was graduating from high school that evening, and we were planning to attend, plus we were looking to buy some furniture--so we debated for a moment what to do. My normal gut reaction in that situation has always been to steer clear of police activity. But Michelle and I were in agreement that something didn't quite look right. Why would the police need eight cars to handle some small issue in a virtually empty parking lot on a small community college campus?
It would've been the easiest thing in the world to ignore what was happening, go vote, then move along to the next item on the list. But we recognized, also, that one of the privileges we enjoy as White people is that we just don't have to get involved with police interactions with Black people. And we recognized, in that moment, that we're just both so very tired of seeing those interactions end with Black people hurt or killed.
So we decided to put our business on hold for a bit. We got out of our car, walked to a better vantage point--respectfully away from the activity, but certainly close enough to hear some of what was being said, and to see what was going on. Michelle took out her phone and began filming the scene.
We stood there, quietly, watching and listening. We were in the wide open. The police officers certainly saw us. The women who were speaking to police noticed us and pointed to us at one point.
As the scene unfolded, it became clear that a third Black person, a man, was under arrest and had been handcuffed and put into one of the police SUVs. From the conversation we could hear, we gathered that the man had done something--perhaps an outright assault--to the woman or her daughter. There seemed to be a restraining order violation, perhaps a probation violation, and it became very clear that the women whom the police were questioning were the complaining witnesses and did not seem to be in any danger from the police. At one point, one of the officers opened the back door of the SUV where the man was being held, and there were words exchanged. The arrestee was plainly agitated. The officer removed the man's shoes for some reason. At another point, the woman removed a bent metal broom or mop handle from her truck, and that was taken by one of the officers as evidence.
We were not there to advocate for anyone's position, nor do either of us have a problem with proper policing that leads to arrests of this sort, when warranted by the facts. Our small role that day was simply to be witnesses, to provide an independent record of what was happening, in the event that something did happen. Our presence did appear to have some impact. Shortly after we started filming, five of the police cars left the scene. Several of the police officers, who had been conversing about the situation (as far as we could tell) moved their conversation to the far side of one of the SUVs, out of camera view.
It is an unfortunate fact of long standing in American society that Black people's interactions with police can and do lead to violence, perpetrated by police against Black people for no reason other than that they are Black. It is another fact that violence occurs more readily and with fewer consequences when no one is watching. I cannot necessarily physically stop police from being brutally violent in that situation. But I can be a witness. I can make my presence known. I can film what is happening, and I can testify to it.
My own interactions with police have been thankfully rare and mostly positive, or at least neutral. But I'm White; I'm well-off enough to live in a nice neighborhood in a safe city; and I don't generally engage in behaviors that are likely to bring me into contact with police. Those are all privileges that not everyone enjoys. The very least I can do is to use my position to make it known to police that they are being watched, and thereby to understand that the lives of the people they are dealing with--whether or not those people have committed crimes or infractions, whether or not they have a respectful attitude, whether or not they're present in this country legally, and so forth--do matter.
I am on so many levels disgusted that it was even necessary to do what we did. But we--all of us--owe it to our fellow Americans to take whatever steps we can, large or small, to enforce their right to respect as human beings. And I, for one, will be looking for more opportunities to do just that. I hope you'll join me.
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