Helpless

 

I watch with horror as the events in Ferguson, Missouri unfold.  I will not pretend I know exactly what happened but I know as sure as I am a white middle class woman from the East that a white youngster jay walking or being a smart mouth would not have been shot dead. And if you differ I want to hear the details of those incidents that parallel the deaths of so many young black men in this country.

How many times can this happen in this country before we find a solution. I feel helpless. I like to take action . To DO something. But for the life of me I can't think what.

I live in New Jersey and can tell you that the standing comment as we drive on major highways like the NJ Turnpike or Garden State Parkway and see cops pulling someone over is," Oops driving while Black."  Years ago a study came out citing that the police in New Jersey were profiling. ya think! It continues.

I wonder if we need to look at what prompts someone to become a policeman. Is it a need for power and control? Is it suppressed rage? I don't know but I wonder if there is an intersect between the psychology of who chooses that career and their behavior on the job.

I worked in psychiatry for years. Patients sometimes got upset and were unpredictable. We didn't have guns.  We "talked" people down. Maybe police offers need to lose their guns and figure out how to deal with people in other ways.

I guess we are still giving lip service to community policing. To knowing the community you serve in intimate ways. And now thanks to " political correctness" it is harder to really know what a police officer may "really think" while patrolling a community like Ferguson Missouri.    

 I don't mean to disparage an entire group of police officers as most do a difficult and dangerous job remarkably well. We need a well trained group of law enforcement professionals to keep society running smoothly, and in fact to protect the store owners in Ferguson from a small group of looters doing damage to an already raw community. 

Answers have to come. In the meantime those of us who don't know what to do to help

 can do what we can to promote understanding and dialogue and opportunity in the communities where we live.