the riot: V1N3

riot cop - banksy

after a teaching session at glenview middle school today i headed to fruitvale BART station for a public protest. early new year's day, a young man, Oscar Grant, and several others were detained after BART police responded to a disturbance on the train. he was face down and restrained, then inexplicably, BART PD officer Johannes Mehserle, shot Grant in the back. the bullet ricocheted off the ground and into Grant's chest. he died at oakland highland a few hours later. he was 22 years old with a 4 year old daughter.

(Mehserle resigned from BART PD Wednesday. his attorney and the police officer's union are running interference to avoid having him interviewed by investigators).

local people were outraged, particularly young folks. i've been involved in protests many times over the years, even rioting when i was younger. i believe in peaceful civil disobedience. unless people are defending their right to gather and protest or fighting oppression. i'm not at all down with rioting just to riot. destruction for the sake of destruction does nothing to advance a cause. it has to have a purpose. if you're going to tare it down, put something else in its place. but i can understand the anger surrounding this.

what's a deeper issue is the institutional racism embedded in our culture. young black and latino men, are consistently profiled and perceived as a threat and one's perception defines one's reality. as liberal as the bay area is there are communities that are economically and culturally segregated, not unlike other urban areas in america. we're a culture often at odds with ourselves and our past for one simple reason : this country embraced slavery, which created a social hierarchy that exists to this day, just in more subtle and covert ways.

my decision to participate in the protest included my own frustrations with the system. it's a slippery slope when you believe yourself to be a functioning member of society, but yet still feel a bit wary, a sort of outsider, moving through that society. i never really feel that the police are on my side, because they don't essentially represent my side.

it was cool to hear young people speak up at the rally. particularly impressive was admitting we as a people need to get our shit together with ourselves and our communities. young men need to step up and be fathers to their children (obama spoke to the importance of this), our attitudes have to change, how we live, how we eat, and that education is crucial.

people don't know they're enslaved until they become aware they're enslaved.
- assata shakur

the march started off down international blvd. i continued on with the crowd for an hour before i ducked out to use the restroom at pollo loco. i went on with my evening, feeling satisfied that it was a positive gathering. the march continued into downtown and a rogue group of kids set it off; setting dumpsters on fire, smashing parked cars, and completely undermining the point of the protest. they were not defending, just being defiant. but i understand. youth should be defiant. yet still seeing young men go off; the others become ever more other and away and nothing changes. people tend see only the horde of aggressive young black men a scary entity and not a sum of individuals too hyped up to articulate themselves. the human mind can be better swayed by words than violent action. what can inspire more - a poem or vengeance?

i encounter many students in the public school system that i wish were my own sons. this is a hard country for young black men. i can't imagine a more complex, yet dignified purpose than trying to raise one to be a man.