Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

OTHER VOICES:

Ferguson shooting is part of a broader problem in the nation

With Ferguson, Mo., still convulsing over Michael Brown’s death at the hands of a police officer, the shocking truth is that such shootings of young black men are too commonplace.

A report published by ProPublica, an investigative journalism organization, says young black men are 21 times more likely to be shot by police than young white men.

This report confirms what black communities and black people everywhere have always known: that the police are much more likely to brutalize us than anyone else. The report points out that this fact holds true even when the police officers involved in the violence are black.

We need to find ways both to protest fatal shootings when they occur and to work for change in the ways our police interact with people.

We need to remind the police that they work for all of us here in America. We all pay taxes and we all employ them, so they should treat all of us equally. And they should protect and serve, not brutalize and murder.

We need to find new ways to train police officers. A major change has to take place in the way they view themselves and the communities where they work. They should not be an occupying force. Ideally, police officers should live in the communities they police so as to identify with residents and not treat them as suspects.

We need to make sure all police have good training in using their weaponry effectively — but not reflexively in a lethal manner; the “shoot to kill” training needs to be replaced by a policy of using the least force necessary, not the maximum force.

Using Tasers, for instance, has reduced the number of fatal police shootings in places like my home city, Cincinnati, but Tasers, too, can be misused. Police need to be trained to use Tasers and other weapons properly.

All police should wear body video cameras. These cameras have reduced incidences of police misbehavior by 60 percent in some cities and towns where they have been used. We can’t rely on the coincidence of someone taking a video of an incident. Police need to know we are watching all the time.

And we need citizen review boards and outside investigators who have the power to compel district attorneys to bring charges against police officers who kill someone in dubious circumstances. Too often, district attorneys choose not to prosecute the police who work for them. And too often, police officers protect their own, even when they know they have a bad cop in their midst.

Ferguson won’t be an isolated incident. Black people and our allies will not stand for police snuffing out the lives of young black people any longer.

Starita Smith, Ph.D., has been an award-winning journalist at the Gary Post-Tribune, the Columbus Dispatch and the Austin American-Statesman. She wrote this for Progressive Media Project.

Join the Discussion:

Check this out for a full explanation of our conversion to the LiveFyre commenting system and instructions on how to sign up for an account.

Full comments policy