Given what I’m about to say, I’m embarrassed to admit it: I’m a white person who is both embarrassed and ashamed. When I saw the reports about the shootings of Philando Castile and Alton Sterling, I was struck dumb. The only thought that came to my mind was “breaking point!”
If after all the shootings of Black men wasn’t enough, now two more? What were the policemen thinking who caused these two deaths? Do they live in this country? Are they totally unaware of the frightening spike in racial tensions that have grown increasingly intense with each new death?
It was just a matter of time. Having come of age in the period of Dr. King’s non-violent civil rights movement, I hoped the peace would hold but somehow I already knew it wouldn’t.
I think half the country had the same “dark foreboding” something bad was going to happen. Maybe we were still shocked when the news came out of Dallas that five officers had been gunned down by Micah Johnson—shocked but not surprised . . . and then Gavin Long in Baton Rouge killed three more.
One story after another to send one’s head reeling . . . violence out of France—terrorist attacks in Paris and Nice–and then a long string of killings of Black men in America, culminating in two attacks upon police officers in Dallas and Baton Rouge: and the name Micah Johnson was broadcast to the world.
I heard reports discussing whether this was a “new normal” and whether such violent attacks would become monthly, weekly, or daily. The consensus seemed to be “weekly”.
Indeed, I do not know if I’ll be able to finish writing about these recent events before the next death of a Black man or the next attack on a police officer occurs. I’ll try . . . but there’s no guarantee.
Although I want to say “I hate Micah Johnson”, I can’t. And although I’d like to blame him for everything and pretend the crime starts and stops with him, I can’t do that either.
The long racial nightmare of America is too omnipresent to pretend this act didn’t happen within the context of America’s brutal mistreatment of Black people ever since the very beginning of colonial times, continuing on through the Revolution, Civil War, Jim Crow laws, and Segregation.
Racism and second-class citizenship ruled the land. The brutality of the slave-owner gave way to the brutality of the KKK and the police. If ever a shooting had context, this one does.
And then a long-forgotten name came to my mind: Nat Turner. He was probably the most hated Black man in the South ever. Nat had “got religion” and felt a higher calling to free himself and his people. Against hopeless odds, he led a small slave rebellion. He and his followers armed themselves the best they could and started killing white people. Eventually enough white men rallied to arms to stop him and then began the reprisals, the hangings of hundreds.
It wasn’t pretty what Nat had done: it was brutal and murderous. It wasn’t pretty what Micah Johnson did, either. And yet, regarding Nat Turner’s slave rebellion, what of the context of Slavery with Black slaves routinely exploited, oppressed, and brutalized with no hope of escape or emancipation?
Nat Turner’s act of bloody defiance raised him to heroic heights in the eyes of other slaves and among those who cherish freedom, if one understands that desperate times produce desperate measures; he struck a blow against Slavery and was willing to sacrifice his life in the larger struggle for freedom.
In a strange way–in this sense of desperation, this sense of needing to strike and deliver a counterblow– Micah Johnson has something in common with Nat Turner. Of course, no one is going to say the year 2016 looks anything like the year 1831. It’s a vastly different time in so many ways, thankfully. But we would be amiss not to acknowledge that we must also deal with perception.
For Black people everywhere in the country–and for a growing number of white people, too–the videos showing police officers killing Black people for insufficient cause has shocked and outraged us past the point of comprehension.
Marches have been held; old groups and new organizations, like Black Lives Matter, do what they can to protest and bring about change; and yet the killings keep on happening. Nothing stops or slows down such incidents and even if an officer is charged there never seems to be a conviction.
And then the “breaking point” arrives, ready or not: the point at which a person decides working through normal channels is too slow or of no avail. Something snaps into place or out of place: it hardly matters. The lethal intention takes over.
Something bigger and more dramatic must be invoked—and so the shots rang out in Dallas and Baton Rouge that killed police officers who, in the eyes of many, were “innocent” and only “doing their duty”. Yes, they were murdered and that is the worst of all crimes. Such crimes must be condemned by all.
And that is true and doubly true so far as it goes—especially if we never wish to talk context or discuss the long string of shootings of Black men, most unarmed, that preceded these god-awful events.
We have a choice: to take into consideration the historical context of these shootings or pretend they are spontaneous crimes unrelated to social reality. Blame the shooter for being crazy, violent, sick, psychopathic, or what have you—but the context still won’t dissolve away.
The first way leads to discussion and hope; the second way leads to more shootings and more deaths, both black and white, with more bereaved families, more widows and fatherless children.
And as for the invisible link between Micah Johnson and Nat Turner? I’ll leave the reader with these remarks from the author of Nat Turner’s Slave Rebellion:
“If and when humanism arrives and animalism is driven from the world, Nat Turner will be labeled as one who fought against the latter. His motives will be admired and sadness, and amazement, perhaps, will grip the observer who will realize that, with those admirable motives, society, as then arranged, made his bloody deeds necessary.” (emphasis added)
