Soft Bigotry

For some reason, people in the media simply expected riots in Los Angeles in the wake of the execution of Tookie Williams. As if violence can be the only possible release for black people. I mean, the last 20 years of Williams' life was dedicated to the idea of nonviolent resistance and the futility of armed struggle. And you expected burning cars?

I think a lot of people, particularly in Los Angeles, are saddened by the fact that a Nobel Peace Prize nominee was silenced by a state-sponsored act. I personally don't understand how a man who spent 20 years trying to get kids out of gangs needed to be killed for the safety of the state. All that was deterred here is the idea that you can go to jail and redeem yourself; prison rehabilitation must seem pretty futile by now. I understand the deep feelings on both sides of this debate, but explain to me why wouldn't life in prison without the possibility of parole been a sufficient punishment?

But that doesn't mean the only answer is to break store windows. Maybe the media expected riots in LA today because they have low expectations of certain groups of people in general; or maybe it's because they refuse to give context to the death penalty debate, and so everything must be seen on the black-and-white scale of "if people are mad, of course they'll destroy their own neighborhood." They could actually do a great service here by contextualizing the debate, allowing for personal expression from all points of view, and letting the entire country weigh in on this issue. But that's asking a little much.

In the meantime, Crooked Timber links to another death-row story that is absolutely chilling, and yet another reason why we have to seriously rethink this policy of state-sponsored executions.

The guts of it is that Cory Maye is a black man on death row for shooting a white police officer dead. The officer was part of a paramilitary no-knock drug raid which broke down the door of Maye’s apartment in the middle of the night, when he and his young daughter were sleeping. Apparently the officers thought they were entering the house of a suspected drug dealer, when in fact the building was a duplex and the individual named in the warrant lived on the other side. Maye woke up, took his gun and shot Jones, who later died. Mayes was tried, apparently was not well-represented, and was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death.

Let's talk about this instead of perpetuating the myth of "black people will riot if there's an injustice."

UPDATE: Neal Boortz is batting 1000%:

... I believe that the main reason the execution of Tookie Williams won't be executed (wrong- ed.) is because Schwarzenegger knows full well that as soon as Tookie's death is announced there will be riots in South Central Los Angeles and elsewhere. (wrong- ed.)  The huge media exploitation of this story has made drop-dead sure of that.  There are thugs just waiting for an excuse ... not a reason, an excuse. (wrong- ed.) The rioting, of course, will lead to wide scale looting. (wrong- ed.) There are a lot of aspiring rappers and NBA superstars who could really use a nice flat-screen television right now.

How do you pack that much racism and bad predictions into just one paragraph? What a talent.