“There’s a history we have to overcome”
by Tom Sullivan
So, by now you know that the New York grand jury we wrote about on Tuesday returned its decision yesterday not to indict NYPD’s Officer Daniel Pantaleo for the July 17 chokehold death of Eric Garner. The 43 year-old black man died gasping “I can’t breathe” while in the custody of white officers outside a Staten Island convenience store after being accused of selling untaxed, loose cigarettes. The death was ruled a homicide by a New York medical examiner in August.
Oh, but the grand jury did indict the man who videoed the whole thing on his cellphone, so there’s that.
Protests broke out over the grand jury’s non-indictment, as expected, disrupting the Christmas tree lighting at Rockefeller Plaza. Police made about 30 arrests.
Arrests going down at 47th and 6th Avenue. Massive standoff between police and protesters. pic.twitter.com/b9Xcgqhuzo— ANIMALNewYork (@ANIMALNewYork) December 4, 2014
Reacting to the grand jury decision, the New York Times’ Charles Blow wrote that biases are pervasive and sometimes unnoticed, just beyond our awareness:
I would love to live in a world where that wasn’t the case. Even more, I would love my children to inherit a world where that wasn’t the case, where the margin for error for them was the same as the margin for error for everyone else’s children, where I could rest assured that police treatment would be unbiased. But I don’t. Reality doesn’t bend under the weight of wishes. Truth doesn’t grow dim because we squint.
We must acknowledge — with eyes and minds wide open — the world as it is if we want to change it.
But New York Mayor Bill de Blasio’s statement went to the heart of the matter. De Blasio has had to have “the talk” with his own son about how to behave in encounters with police:
This is profoundly personal to me. I was at the White House the other day, and the president of the United States turned to me, and he met Dante a few months ago, and he said that Dante reminded him of what he looked like as a teenager. And he said I know you see this crisis through a very personal lens. And I said to him, I did.
Because Chirlane and I have had to talk to Dante for years about the dangers that he may face. A good young man, law-abiding young man who would never think to do anything wrong. And yet, because of a history that still hangs over us, the dangers he may face, we’ve had to literally train him—as families have all over this city for decades—in how to take special care in any encounter he has with the police officers who are there to protect him.
And that painful sense of contradiction that our young people see first, that our police are here to protect us, and we honor that, and at the same time, there’s a history we have to overcome, because for so many of our young people, there’s a fear. And for so many of our families, there’s a fear.
So I’ve had to worry over the years. Chirlane’s had to worry. Is Dante safe each night? There are so many families in this city who feel that each and every night. Is my child safe? And not just from some of the painful realities—crime and violence in some of our neighborhoods—but is safe from the very people they want to have faith in as their protectors.
Bloomberg reports that the U.S. Justice Department will conduct a civil rights probe into the episode.
“We are dealing with centuries of racism that has brought us to this day,” the mayor said. “That is how fundamental the task at hand is: to turn from that history and make a change that is profound and lasting.”
Eric Garner didn’t get a chance to hold his breath waiting for that.