(08.13.2011) Brief Thoughts on the Police Killing of Yet Another Black Man in Britain:

08/09/2013 · by · in Uncategorized

Why the Plight of the Asiatic Black Man and Police Brutality Should Be Everyone’s Problem

by

The Angryindian

08.13.2011

“This is the Deep South”, I said. “When you have Negro guests, do you have any trouble with your White guests”?

No…no…the type of White man who would come to the Trappists – well, he comes here to be in an atmosphere of dedication to God. Such a man would hardly keep one eye on God and the other on the colour of a man’s skin”.

 – John Howard Griffin – ‘Black Like Me’

—

 

This commentary is in recognition of:

Mark Duggan (UK)

Derrick Jones (US)

Kenneth Harding (US)

Amadou Diallo (US)

Mulrunji Doomadgee (AUS)

Kingsley Burrell (UK)

John T. Williams (US)

Smiley Culture (UK)

Jean Charles de Menezes (UK)

Deacon Frederick Williams (US)

Sean Bell (US)

Ayanna Jones (US)

Oscar Grant (US)

And now as of this re-publishing (09.08.2013):

Trayvon Martin (US)

Remarley Graham (US)

Kenneth Chamberlain (US)

Derek Williams (US)

& a host of other Africans Indigenous Americans and other People of Colour

who have lost their lives at the hands of police officers in the course of their duty.

As the international mainstream media continues to aggressively downplay the social and economic causes of the Tottenham Riots and elsewhere in the UK while highlighting the government’s crackdown on both violent looters and legitimate peaceful protesters the name of Mark Duggan has been largely forgotten. In fact, the killing of a young, African married father of four during a violent encounter with the City of London’s Metropolitan Police has received little respect in the corporate media at all. And had the riots never occurred, there is a very strong possibility that no one would even know the name Mark Duggan. Or the fact that he had a family and a life of his own separate from the social outbursts that have sprung from the general public’s justified anger over his extra-judicial killing.

Now that the iPCC has officially admitted that they wrongfully encouraged the public to believe that Mr. Duggan had fired a weapon at the police, there is now a credible dispute over whether or not the firearm attributed to Mr. Duggan actually belonged to him. And given the ugly particulars behind the false report given by the London Metropolitan Police officers involved in the original conflict, why should we assume that the weapon ‘found’ at the scene was his? How many other UK citizens Black, White, Brown and in-between have been found sapped of their lives after encountering the police and other security personnel? According to bloggers such as Alexander Higgins and others in Britain the number, disregarding ethnicity, stands at 333 people who have been killed by UK police officers between 1998 and 2010 alone.

Please note that this tally does not count the violent and otherwise abusive encounters citizens face when dealing with the police during this period, before or even after. Even so, no one within a position of ‘responsibility’, (the Tories favourite word) is willing to admit in a appropriately broad sense that this Black man had a human right not to be killed by the police and then demonised by his nation’s government or media as a ‘thug’ without credible evidence. And as of this writing the public has still not been told why the vehicle Mr. Duggan was riding in was stopped in the first place. And both the MET and the English news media establishment have yet to take full responsibility for encouraging the heightened social tensions that led to the outbursts of anti-social violence.

It must be said here that this writer is thoroughly appalled by the random destructiveness and viciousness shown by the numerous social misfits, bastards and joy looters that used this disturbance as a cover for their own selfish misdeeds. Bread and butter criminality should be addressed and no one disputes that. Having said that, it must be made clear that there is a distinct political and ideological difference between those who were demanding justice for a victim of police brutality and the rabble who were acting out of personal frustration with the whole society at large.

The MET police it is clear were not and are not at all concerned about these particulars. And like the individual officers responsible for the Duggan killing, the MET as an arm of the British government has decided on its own that the use of deadly force is a prerogative exclusive to the state and its chosen agents. To Hell with what ‘rights’ the general public may believe they have, professional British police backed-up by the Prime Minister have made it abundantly clear that they are the masters of life and death. And if you are Black, and male, this means that each time you step out of the safety of your home there is a strong possibility that you may not return if you are unlucky enough to have to deal with the police.

So beware Black & Brown Britain, because England is not what it claims to be. Its rose is not meant for you. Even if you were born within the audio reach of Big Ben, England is not yours. It is not a socially-equal democracy and it has not moved beyond its own issues with anti-African xenophobia and petty racism. On the once merry streets of what used to be England the police have evolved into a brutal, uniformed gang of the state and of the rich. This is not to say that this was not always situation anyway, but it is to say that after the hypocrisies of the 2011 riots, the MET now comes across more like a band of racist thugs donned in riot-gear than as professional peace officers working with and by the community’s consent. Mark Duggan is dead. This cannot be undone. And the question remains, how many more Black men must die at the hands of police officers before someone, other than the damaged families of the victims, admits that anti-African racial profiling by police in European and Euro-settler nations is a fact of life? And, that it is wrong?

This killing should be of concern to everybody, not just African and immigrant communities of colour. When the Prime Minister immediately went public with an announcement that rogue force would be liberally employed by the state as a means of restoring order in Tottenham and greater London this was a warning to the public. It says a great deal about our prospects for progress in relations between police and the communities in which they are supposed to serve. The violence that came to Mark Duggan should not have happened. And the questions surrounding why his killing was covered-up by law enforcement, the mainstream media and the Conservative Party leaders has yet to be fully explained by our betters in the international ‘establishment’.

I say international because a Euro-American police professional, William Bratton, has been hired by the British government to ‘assist’ them in dealing with the public disturbances resulting from the Duggan killing. There are serious problems with this idea and it simply takes a brief review of his record as a policeman in the United States and how the US itself handles its poverty-driven crime issues to see that the UK government has yet again punked-out in favour of ‘Americanizing’ England via the US model and its business and national security-state community.

Mr. Bratton may be promoted by the international Europocentric press as a ‘Supercop’, but for African, Latino and sexual minority communities who reside in the US cities where he has worked, his legend was, they say, constructed solely upon his heavy-handed approach to aggressive and biased policing of minority and poverty-stricken communities. Even the mainstream US media has noticed that his stated perspectives on race-neutral policing present a serious problem for communities that have long suffered from violent, systematic and often lethal abuse at the hands of police officers. This is a national, and now international, question of basic human rights, but even the first African-American US president will not speak about it, which says much about his ties to the African community at home and abroad as it does about his political commitment to universal human and social justice. As far as the African community in the US is concerned, they are the victims of historical racism and social negligence, and for them, Bratton’s leadership has never, in any case, ever worked towards progressively solving the long-standing problems of urban community policing.

The MET police it is clear were not and are not at all concerned about these particulars. And like the individual officers responsible for the Duggan killing, the MET as an arm of the British government has decided on its own that the use of deadly force is a prerogative exclusive to the state and its chosen agents. To Hell with what ‘rights’ the general public may believe they have, professional British police backed-up by the Prime Minister have made it abundantly clear that they are the masters of life and death. And if you are Black, and male, this means that each time you step out of the safety of your home there is a strong possibility that you may not return if you are unlucky enough to have to deal with the police.

So beware Black & Brown Britain, because England is not what it claims to be. Its rose is not meant for you. It is not a socially-equal democracy and it has not moved beyond its own issues with anti-African xenophobia and petty racism. On the once merry streets of what used to be England the police have evolved into a brutal, uniformed gang of the state and of the rich. This is not to say that this was not always situation anyway, but it is to say that after the hypocrisies of the 2011 riots, the MET now comes across more like a band of racist thugs donned in riot-gear than as professional peace officers working with and by the community’s consent. Mark Duggan is dead. How many more Black men must die at the hands of police officers in the UK before someone, other than the damaged families of the victims, admits that racial profiling by police in Britain is a fact of life. And, that it is wrong.

This should be of concern to everybody, not just African and immigrant communities of colour. When the Prime Minister immediately went public with an announcement that rogue force would be liberally employed by the state as a means of restoring order in Tottenham and greater London this was a warning to the public. It says a great deal about our prospects for progress in relations between police and the communities in which they are supposed to serve. The violence that came to Mark Duggan should not have happened. And the questions surrounding why his killing was covered-up by law enforcement, the mainstream media and the Conservative Party leaders has yet to be fully explained by our betters in the international ‘establishment’.

I say international because an Euro-American police professional, William Bratton, has been hired by the British government to ‘assist’ them in dealing with the public disturbances resulting from the Duggan killing. There are serious problems with this idea and it simply takes a brief review of his record as a policeman in the United States and how the US handles crime to see that the UK government has yet again punked-out in favour of ‘Americanizing’ England via the US business and national security-state community.

At the risk of offending my more sensitive readers, my cultural relations and the various political gypsies that regularly read my commentaries, I must state at this juncture that I have absolutely no problem with peace officers who perform their duties professionally and with respect to rights and basic humanity of the people. I accept the necessity for qualitative peace work just as I accept the necessity for a rational system of national defence and for honest intelligence services. I am not a naive cherub who does not recognise the negative. Nor am I paranoid. And am quite aware and I understand the basic math of the situation.

What I do not accept are disingenuous arguments for overwhelming and unjustified policing of individual rights and liberties based solely upon the fears of the landed gentry and the capitalist class. Adam Smith put it best when the said that the state exists only to defend the claims of the ownership class. And I, along with other conscious people, take issue with the unspoken suggestion that People of Colour living in the White world, must simply accept the reality that institutional racism exists in government and in the police forces and that this bias is a normal part of modern policing. Such sentiments ring extremely chilling to people living under European domination. s and their influence in Afghanistan, Iraq, Israel, Libya, Syria, Egypt, Sudan, Mexico, Puerto Rico, Guam, Hawai’i, Lebanon, Yugoslavia, Cuba, Venezuela, Palestine, Alaskan Natives and the Indigenous peoples living in Pakistan’s Tribal areas

It is about time that we discuss and deconstruct these differences before the Dickensonian violence we are witnessing around the world becomes all that we are. I personally prefer sane and peaceful alternatives to social unrest, so let us begin here by understanding the cognitive dynamics behind why Africans, more than any other human group, suffer from atrocious levels uncalled for abuse at the hands of the world’s powers. And let us also take the time to understand who it is that helps enable this mistreatment and why until the issue of African self-colonialism is logically addressed, none of us is truly free.

In the meantime here are my humble suggestions for moving forward in Britain after the Tottenham Riots of 2011:

1. The immediate investigation and prosecution of the police officers who were directly involved in the killing of Mark Duggan. This includes a serious and transparent investigation of the MET and the government officials who were instrumental in covering up the true facts of this incident and those who knowingly presented a series of false and racist rumours about Mr. Duggan in order to justify the deadly use of force.

2. Address ‘Racial-Profiling’ as a human rights violation, which it is, and end the policy of race-based police containment in the African and immigrant communities of the UK and across the White world.

3. The immediate and unconditional release of all urban youth detained as a result of the rebellion sparked by the police killing and bad-jacketing of Mark Duggan. Instead of hiring someone from a country that cannot deal honesty with its own police-brutality problems the UK government and landed gentry could enact a policy of urban economic development. Just the cure for proletarian social unrest in a just and sane society.

4. Reparations must be be paid without delay to the widow and family of Mark Duggan and all those killed, injured and otherwise physically and materially harmed by the outbreak of violence. Ultimately, the British government is responsible for the conditions that created the riots. And it is they that should fix the problems. Putting the price of repair upon the victims of injustice merely perpetuates the injustice.

5. And if they are feeling generous, the UK could effectively end its involvement in wars of aggression against the people of Africa living in the Motherland and across the Diaspora.

-TheAngryindian

NOTES:

  1.  Guardian: The Ignored London Riots Context – 333 Deaths In Police Custody, 0 Convictions
  2. Cory Doctorow: UK gov’t wants to legalize racial profiling – Boing Boing
  3.  Getting Rich from the TSA Naked-Body Scanners :Raven Clabough -New American,  Thursday, 18 November 2010
  4.  UK: Racial profiling encouraged: by nukegingrich | October 20, 2007
  5.  Stop and search plans are ‘discriminatory’, watchdog warns | Law | The Guardian
  6.  Getting Rich from the TSA Naked-Body Scanners :Raven Clabough -New American,  Thursday, 18 November 2010
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