Its not racism

So.. been home with a summer time cold/sinus deal, which has forced me to watch way more TV than I a) really want.. b) is good for anyone. So giving the current media circus over the "beer summit" at the White House, I watched only a small snippet of some panel discussion on race relations in the US. Without knowing the facts( of the incident).. and really without caring about the facts, there are a few things I would like to expound upon. Before I go too far though.. let me say that I feel I am treading a very fine line.. it is in fact a "be careful what you wish for" post.

There is a 3000 lb gorilla in the room on this, and to ignore its existence is to dismiss any credence on the part of the speaker. And yet, it is exactly that gorilla that all the pundits are ignoring. Going there is very very dangerous. So lets do it then.

I have no doubt that blacks in general are treated by police authorities as more likely to be guilty of some crime than white counter parts. But I will only concede that and return that native Americans ( where they can be found) are treated even worse, and that Mexicans are treated even worse than that AND that Arab "looking" individuals are treated EVEN worse than that. So as far as I am concerned any pundit that would look to change how those with authority look ONLY at one racial group (blacks) are in effect just as bad or even worse than those that would say that treatment is currently equal. But I submit that these problems are, on the whole minute and petty. There is a much bigger problem, one that feeds the above problem. In fact as far as I am concerned anyone wishing to deal with the above problem only should utterly be dismissed, for they can only feed the larger problem regardless of what path they look to.

The 3000 lb gorilla is the willingness of the general public and the courts to instill a since of empowerment to authorities to usurp rights of the general public for the security and "good" of the public. In my opinion this empowerment has been growing for decades and has lead to a momentum function that allows the current court/police/political system to charge forward, with no restraint available to the public. We have created our own monster, and it will devour us.

There are many aspects to this monster, and to be fair, it every ones fault.. that is to say the police operate as they feel they expected too, the courts want to assist with the mission and they respond as they feel they are expected to, and the politicians... they are elected to make problems go away, with the general expectation that they will do so without bothering the general populace. Therefore I submit that police function as they because we allow it. But to truly get change we to removed the function of self empowerment and then regain a system with sufficent checks and balances that make such actions simply not expected .. not tolerated.