Thanks Ta-Nehisi Coates for what in my opinion was the most perceptive thing I read on last month’s Gates-Crowley-Obama brouhaha. I know many feel it was over-reported then and it feels like ancient history now, but his distinction between disproportionate and majority is an especially important insight. Finishes strong too in the last two paragraphs.
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What Gates, President Obama, and the others did was shameful and prejudiced. They publicly categorized Officer Crowley as a stupid, racist cop, and as this article suggests, they did it because of the way they’ve been treated by the police before. They are excused for their racism because the man has been keeping them down is what this article says even though one is the President of the United States and the other is a Harvard professor. So President Obama and Gates engaged in precisely what they hold as the sin of sins, discrimination, (against Officer Crowley) rather than learn the reasons for his actions or walk a mile in his shoes. Of course when they discriminate and get criticized everyone just laughs it off and the President placates and patronizes everyone by inviting them to have a beer. Is that leadership? Is that changing the tenor of racism and discrimination of all sorts in our world? Hardly.
Thanks for the honest reply. I think Coates and you need to get together for a beer the next time your’re in D.C. hobknobbing with the Republican elite. :) Some probably did call Crowley racist, but not P.O. I don’t see Coates’s brief history lesson as excusing reverse racism. Why was the WH invitation placating and patronizing rather than an effort to “learn the reasons for his actions”? If Crowley felt patronized he should have declined. Maybe you’ll be happy to learn I’m tapped out on race for now. Maybe I should turn to cycling and detail how I. . . once again. . . passed you like you were standing still yesterday.
Officer Crowley sold out.