Police Design Matters

Policing Design Matters

As we enter into the beginning of Black History Month, where we will prepare to retell, celebrate, and revisit the stories and histories of Black people in our country, there’s lots going on in our world impacting Black life and its ability to thrive. Our nation is grappling with the senseless death of Trye Nichols, killed by a policing system’s blueprint that rendered black life expendable yet again. It is easy to think that Tyre’s killing is different from George Floyd’s but they are not. Racism is pernicious and the impact of its power killed them both. The impact of racism is always about prejudice and power. It reaches across racial identity by showing up as either internalized superiority, or internalized oppression. Both internalizations are experiences fueled by prejudice and societal messaging about blackness. It is important to remember that prejudice is defined as a preconceived opinion that is not based on reason or actual experience. This means that anyone can be subject to it. 
 
I remember organizing with Dr. Parks our 2017 Spiritus Christi Race Convoy South. At our first stop we were talking to a Black parole officer in Columbus, Ohio named Cory where 13-year-old Tyre King was gunned down by the police in 2016. Cory was familiar with every detail of the story and recounted how he undertook the work with idealism and a compassionate commitment to change the system. However, it wasn’t a few seconds later that he said that the system came for him where cynicism and clearly prejudice set in, that prompted him to declare the words, “I now believe as the police do, and that is that all black youth are equally dangerous.” I remember in that moment feeling that if that is the starting place in thinking with black youth, black males, or black people in general, where do you go from there? The answer was that you in effect create a system where black lives will always be at risk with those who are impacted by prejudice and hold systemic power. Changing policing blueprints across this nation is our only hope for excising the permissions of racism embedded since the 1800’s. It is my continued hope that in our country we take a serious look at changing policing blueprints across this nation and passing police reform. It is only in a redesign of what public safety means for all of us that real reform and change can happen. God is clearly calling us in these moments to do the work of love and justice as beloved children of God so that Black and Brown people in this country can be safe and make it home alive to have their day in court!