war

“We Support Our Police” Signs are Empty Gestures or Whitewashing Dysfunction

stevenmsinger #BlackLivesMatter, Accountability, Allegheny County, capitalism, Congress, Donald Trump, Gun Control, Guns, Healthcare, Pennsylvania, Pittsburgh, Police, Politics, Poverty, Prejudice, protest, Racism, Shooting, Social Justice , , , , , , , , , , ,

 
 
It is a tragedy when a police officer is killed in the line of duty. 

Like nearly everyone in McKeesport and the surrounding communities, I mourn for Officer Sean Sluganski who was shot to death last week.

And I hope for the quick recovery of his fellow Officer Chuck Thomas Jr. who also was injured in the same incident. 

However, unlike many of my friends and neighbors, I will not be putting up a sign in my yard saying “We Support Our Police.” 

Nor will I be buying blue lightbulbs or other jingoistic bric-à-brac – even if the proceeds are supposed to be going to the Sluganski family. 

“Why?” you may ask. 

“Why won’t you join in on this act of communal loss, unity and pride?” 

Put simply – because it is at best an empty gesture. And at worst, it’s something much more sinister and alarming. 

“But it’s just a sign,” you say. “How can putting up a sign cause any harm?” 

Okay, I respond. Then tell me what that sign means.  

Really. What does it mean to say “We Support Our Police”? 

Does it mean we should pay them more? I might be able to get behind that sentiment. 

Does it mean we should acknowledge the danger they put themselves in to keep people in the community safe?  

Okay. I acknowledge it.

But let’s be honest here – most of the time police don’t keep the community safe.

They don’t stop crime. Typically they arrive AFTER a crime has already been committed. If anything, they are an instrument of justice – of ensuring the guilty are punished, but let’s not keep up this fantasy that they routinely prevent crime from taking place.

 

At best, this is a deterrent to crime. But that only works if the justice system works – and, frankly, our courts are in shambles. 

How many times have we seen criminals escape consequences – especially if they’re rich and powerful?  

We have people like George Santos in Congress caught in multiple lies and frauds. And nothing seems to be happening to them. 


 
We have people like Matt Gaetz in Congress accused of sex trafficking and assault, and they aren’t even being actively investigated. 


 
We have a former President who lead a coup against our government, and he isn’t being held accountable at all. In fact, he and the other lawmakers who enabled him are still in power and even seeking new terms in office. 


 
You think police deter crime? Not in a country without justice.  


 
If you’re poor and you’re accused of a crime, you often have to spend weeks or months in jail awaiting trial because you can’t make bail. And when you’re incarcerated, you could lose your job, your reputation and who knows what violence may befall you behind bars?  


 
And this is just if you’re accused. There’s no “innocent until proven guilty.” You’re treated like you’re guilty UNLESS you can pay to be treated innocent. 


 
“But this is the justice system,” you say. “The police aren’t responsible for the justice system.” 


 
Maybe not, but they support it. They prop it up. The system couldn’t exist without them.  


 
We often call police the thin blue line, but what is that line between? It’s not between criminals and the law-abiding. It’s between the government and its citizens.

And increasingly between businesses and consumers.


 
The purpose of police is to prop up our system – and it is an unjust system.  


 
If police refused to do that, maybe the system might get fixed.  


 
Take the incident in question where Officer Sluganski was killed.  


 
According to accounts in local papers, he and his partner were responding to what they thought was a domestic dispute. A McKeesport resident – a former member of the military – was suffering from PTSD and acting violently toward his family. He had guns in his home and had already made a death threat to people at a banking institution weeks earlier.  


 
The police knew all about the incident, according to the Pittsburgh Post Gazette, but the details don’t seem to have been accurately conveyed to the officers responding to the scene. And the result was gun play and death.  


 
Is that supporting our police?  


 
Wouldn’t real support be sending a counselor to this person’s home long before it ever got to this situation? Wouldn’t support be disarming someone with a mental illness before he got violent? Wouldn’t it be responding immediately after he made the death threat and not only after he was ready to act on it?  


 
And speaking of supporting the police, what about this mentally ill veteran? If you really want to support our men and women in blue, don’t send so many of our children across the sea to unnecessary wars that enrich the wealthy and waste our resources here at home.  


 
That’s what I’d call supporting the police. Not putting up a stupid sign.  

You want to support the police? How about common sense gun regulations so that there aren’t so many firearms out there with which to shoot them? The US literally has more guns than people and you think a yard sign is doing anything for law enforcement!?


 
It won’t help the police. All it will do is make any criticism of the police or the system they serve seem outrageous.  


 
How dare you criticize our officers or our system!? Don’t you appreciate how this man died!? Don’t you appreciate the bullets he and his partner took for you!? 


 
And that’s the BEST case scenario.  


 
Now let’s look at the other possibility. 


You think there’s no harm that can come from signs like this all across our community? Ask a black person.


 
How many of our black brothers and sisters have police murdered without justifiable cause?  


 
Eric Garner, Sandra Bland, George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Michael Brown….  Poor little Antwon Rose! He was a 17-year-old boy shot and killed five years ago as he was running away from police in East Pittsburgh – not far at all from McKeesport and where last week’s incident took place. 


 
I know his mother. He has family and friends in the school where I’m a teacher.  


 
Michael Rosfeld, the officer who killed Antwon, was fired and he was sued civilly in court. But that doesn’t make up for the murder of a child. 


 
Where are Antwon’s signs? Where are his novelty lightbulbs?  


 
And he is not alone. US law enforcement killed at least 1,176 people in 2022, making it the deadliest year on record for police violence since 2013 when experts first started tracking the killings nationwide, according to new data analysis. 


 
Police across the country killed an average of more than three people a day, or nearly 100 people every month last year according to Mapping Police Violence. 


 
In 2021, police killed 1,145 people; 1,152 in 2020; 1,097 in 2019; 1,140 in 2018; and 1,089 in 2017. 


 
And you want me to put up a sign saying “We Support Our Police?” 


 
I know all police officers are not bad. But the system is. It is broken, and putting up a sign like that helps draw attention away from that fact and ensures nothing will get done to fix it.  

After all, why should we bother? Everyone here supports our police.


 
There are real solutions we could enact that might bring us some peace.  

Clinicians and medics could responded to mental health calls like the one last week instead of the police. In fact, this has been tried successfully in Denver. If they need backup, THEN call police. But you shouldn’t start the interaction with armed law enforcement officers who do not have sufficient training or expertise for these types of situations.  

You could restrict traffic stops for minor violations. Decriminalize things like jaywalking and other minor infractions. We don’t need broken windows policing when it leads to more citizens in body bags and more police getting killed. 

And can we get some gun control? Please?


 
We need broad systematic change to reduce lethal force from police. We need to get rid of qualified immunity for officers so that if they make a mistake, they can be held accountable for it. We need incentives to make them think twice before taking a life. 


 
These are the kinds of things that would START to bring about positive change. These are the kinds of things that I DO support.
 

But, no, I don’t support police without qualification.  


 
I don’t support anyone that far. 


 
It is ridiculous to oversimplify our world down to such a slogan.  


 
That’s why I will mourn with my community over this senseless act of violence.

And I will appreciate all that law enforcement does right.

But I will also demand better for our boys and girls in blue, our community and my black and brown brothers and sisters who bear the brunt of our societal dysfunction. 

 

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Donald Trump, If the US is Attacked, We Will Blame YOU

stevenmsinger Accountability, Budget, capitalism, Civil Rights, Compassion, Congress, Democrat, Donald Trump, Election, Hate Crimes, nonviolence, Politics, Poverty, Prejudice, President, protest, Republican, voting, Yohuru Williams , , , , , ,

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Donald Trump,

Our nation is on the brink of massive violence.

Many people in the Middle East think the United States wants a war with Islam. Our relations with North Korea are more strained than they’ve been in decades. Russia has infiltrated the deepest levels of our government. Our international standing has been called into question. Our closest allies have been insulted and threatened. Our economy continues to stagnate. Our citizens live in fear. Hate groups are ramping up bomb threats, spray painting their rhetoric in public spaces and celebrating it being echoed back to them on the lips and Twitter accounts of our very own lawmakers. For the first time in decades, our sick, our elderly, our children are left to wonder – not if they will have enough – but if they will have anything at all.

All while our military grows fat and anxious and waiting.

It’s a power keg looking for a match.

And it’s mostly your fault.

Don’t think we’re unaware. We see what you and your cabinet of fools and hate-mongers are doing.

We see how they are “dismantling the administrative state.” We see how they are tearing away protections for your own citizens. We see how they are spreading fear and instability. We see how you are preparing the way for the next unnecessary war.

Most of these fires were not started by you, but your policies have poured gasoline on them.

There is only one thing you need to know: we will hold you accountable.

That’s right. We will hold YOU, personally, responsible.

If a terrorist attacks the United States, we will hold YOU accountable.

If a foreign power attacks us, we will hold YOU responsible.

If desperate and frightened Americans lash out at law enforcement or our military, we will hold YOU accountable.

We will not all rally together behind you. We will not close ranks. We will not hide behind the flag and join together to fight whichever enemy you point out.

We have lost too much innocence to believe such fairy tale propaganda anymore. George W. Bush used up the last drop of our bedtime story gullibility. We don’t roll that way anymore. We are cynical and awake.

You will not take advantage of our patriotism. You will not herd us like cattle to follow blindly after you.

We will not let you get away with stoking violence and then using the results as a justification for what you did to cause the problem in the first place.

Violence will not make you stronger. It will give us an excuse to tear you down and remove you from office.

If our nation is attacked, we will know it is because of your xenophobia. You can’t denigrate the entire religion of Islam, one of the most populous faiths in the world, without bringing down the ire of hundreds of millions of people. You can’t libel the intentions and histories of our nation’s multitudinous black and brown people without pushing us closer to violence. You can’t withhold a helping hand from the sick, poor and needy without expecting some to find other more violent ways to survive.

And if even one of these people responds to your government-sanctioned violence with a violence of their own, we will blame you. Because you are responsible.

You are President of the Untied States.

And an illegitimate President at that.

The only power that gives someone in your office the right to rule is the “consent of the governed,” and that, sir, you do not have.

You did not win the popular vote. The governed have not given you their consent. They consented to someone else. You only rule because of crusty bureaucratic red tape – an electoral college system that was put in place centuries past to prop up slavery.

So you will be held accountable if things go south. Because you deserve it.

You will be held responsible – not those poor devils who voted for you out of desperation. You will be taken to account – you and the other billionaire kleptomaniacs who gave voters only a choice of plutocracy or plutocracy – a choice of corporate controlled Democrats or corporate owned Republicans, a slow or a quick death.

Do not for one second think that war or violence or terrorism is in your best interest. It isn’t.

Right now you face deep unpopularity. You face federal investigations, judicial challenges to your rule by executive order, and mounting calls for impeachment.

But if your arrogant and ignorant administration devolves into violence, you will wish for these peacetime challenges.

There will be no more golf weekends at Mar-a-Lago. No more fun time trips to Trump Tower. No more complaints about TV ratings and crowd size. No more whining about protests and marches.

Because Americans are patient. We can wait out your idiotic Presidency. We can challenge you at the proper time and place and take back our country peacefully.

But if your rule breaks the peace, do not expect us to come to your aide.

I am not advocating violence. Just the opposite. But if violence comes, it will because of you.

For you have already woken a sleeping dragon. Beware her fiery breath.

Consider this a prediction, a warning, not a threat.

You will be held accountable.

Sooner or later.

I am a Public School Teacher. Give Me All the Refugees You’ve Got!

stevenmsinger Budget, Compassion, Congress, Education, Hate Crimes, Media, Politics, Poverty, Prejudice, Racism, Refugees, Republican, School Funding, School to Prison Pipeline, Schools, Student Mobility, Teachers, Violence Against Children, White Allies, White Privilege , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

syrian_refugee_schools

Come into my classroom any day of the week and you’ll see refugees.

That little Iraqi boy slumped over a book written in Arabic while the rest of the class reads the same story in English. Those twin girls blinking back memories of the Bosnian War as they try to underline possessive nouns on an English worksheet. That brown-skinned boy compulsively rocking back-and-forth in his seat fighting back tears wondering when his dad is going to come home from prison.

Every day, every hour, every minute our public schools are places of refuge for children seeking asylum, fugitives, emigres, exiles, the lost, the displaced, dear hearts seeking a kind word and a caring glance.

Some may shudder or sneer at the prospect of giving shelter to people in need, but that is the reality in our public schools. In the lives of many, many children we provide the only stability, the only safety, the only love they get all day.

And, yes, I do mean love. I love my students. Each and every one of them. Sometimes they are far from lovable. Sometimes they look at me with distrust. They bristle at assignments. They jump when redirected. But those are the ones I try to love the most, because they are the ones most in need.

I told a friend once that I had a student who had escaped from Iraq. His parents had collaborated with the U.S. military and received death threats for their efforts. So he and his family fled to my hometown so far away from his humid desert heartland.

I told her how difficult it was trying to communicate with a student who spoke hardly any English. I complained about budget cuts that made it next to impossible to get an English Language Learner (ELL) instructor to help me more than once a week. And her response was, “Do you feel safe teaching this kid?”

Do I feel safe? The question had never occurred to me. Why wouldn’t I feel safe? I don’t expect ISIS to track him down across the Atlantic Ocean to my class. Nor do I expect this sweet little guy is going to do anything to me except practice his English.

In one of my first classrooms, I had a dozen refugees from Yugoslavia. They had escaped from Slobadan Milosevic’s ethnic cleansing. Yet you’d never know unless they told you. They were some of the most well-behaved, thoughtful, intelligent children I’ve had the pleasure to teach. They were always smiling, so happy to be here. They approached every assignment with a seriousness well beyond their years.

But sometimes you’d see a shadow cross their faces. Rarely you’d hear them whispering among themselves. I was so new I didn’t know any better but to come down on them. But later they told me what they had been talking about, what they had been thinking about – how Henry V’s military campaign brought back memories. They taught me that day. Every year I learn so much from my children.

My high poverty school doesn’t get a lot of refugees from overseas these days. But we’re overwhelmed with exiles from our own neighborhood. I can’t tell you how many children I’ve had in class who start off the year at one house and then move to another. I can’t tell you how many come to school bruised and beaten. I can’t tell you how many ask a moment of my time between classes, during my planning period or after school just to talk.

Last week one of my students walked up to me and said, “I’m having a nervous breakdown.”

Class had just been dismissed. I had a desk filled to the ceiling with ungraded essays. I still had to make copies for tomorrow’s parent-teacher conferences. I had gotten to none of it earlier because I had to cover another class during my planning period. But I pushed all of that aside and talked with my student for over an hour.

And I’m not alone. On those few days I get to leave close to on time, I see other teachers doing just like me conferencing and tutoring kids after school.

It was a hard conversation. I had to show him he was worth something. I had to make him feel that he was important to other people, that people cared about him. I hope I was successful. He left with a handshake and a smile.

He may not be from far away climes, but he’s a refugee, too. He’s seeking a safe place, a willing ear, a kind word.

So you’ll forgive me if I sigh impatiently when some in the media and in the government complain about the United States accepting more refugees. What a bunch of cowards!

They act as if it’s a burden. They couldn’t be farther from the truth. It’s a privilege.

When I see that iconic picture of three-year-old Syrian boy Aylan Kurdi drowned in Turkey as his family tried to escape the conflict, I find it impossible that anyone could actually refuse these people help. Just imagine! There are a host of others just like this family seeking asylum and we can give it! We have a chance to raise them up, to provide them a place to live, to shelter them from the storm. What an honor! What a privilege! What a chance to be a beacon of light on a day of dark skies!

I’m an American middle class white male. My life hasn’t been trouble free, but I know that I’ve won the lottery of circumstances. Through none of my own doing, I sit atop the social ladder. It is my responsibility to offer a helping hand in every way I can to those on the lower rungs. It is my joy to be able to do it.

It’s what I do everyday at school. When I trudge to my car in the evening dark, I’m exhausted to the marrow of my bones. But I wouldn’t have it any other way.

It’s not uncommon for a student or two to see me on the way to my car, shout out my name with glee and give me an impromptu hug. At the end of the day, I know I’ve made a difference. I love being a teacher.

So if we’re considering letting in more refugees, don’t worry about me. Send them all my way. I’ll take all you’ve got. That’s what public schools do.

NOTE: This article also was published in Everyday Feminism, the LA Progressive and on the Badass Teachers Association blog. It was also quoted extensively in an interview the National Education Association did with the author.