<p>Just out of curiosity, was Gates using his cane as he walked up to his house? Do robbers normally go around walking with a cane? </p>
<p>I’m not sure about racism, but I suspect class may have something to do with it. For all of Gates’ interest in race, I’ll bet he has not had much to do with the police. Harvard profs of his stature are used to being lionized rather than challenged in their own home. Think about it, a MacArthur genius awardee, used to being on TV (and thinking lots of people watch your shows), in fact, just came back from China where he was shooting more documentary, etc… and his right to be in his own home (one owned by Harvard) is questioned!
Meanwhile, the cop is secure in his belief that he is not racist. He tried to save Reggie Lewis, he works every day with African-American cops and he gets along well with them. He knows he is doing the right thing by investigating a complaint of b&e. Not only is Gates not grateful that he is investigating (I would think similar complaints don’t get investigated quite so quickly in different neighborhoods) but he’s hassling him.
A huge misunderstanding all around. The cop should not have arrested Gates (his behavior does not amount to “disorderly conduct” or “violent and tumultuous” behavior) but Gates should by now have recovered his equanimity, and, dare I say it, magnanimity. I’m hoping Denise Simmons, the African-American mayor, can defuse things.</p>
<p>I read an op-ed by a black man today discussing historical racism and how young black men are taught early and often not to provoke the police because it’s so dangerous. One point that he made that I found interesting was to say that both Professor Gates and the officer were channeling institutional racism, but that didn’t necesarily mean that the officer, himself, was a racist.</p>
<p>He made a big mistake. He, along with Gates’ pathetic desire to exploit this (can’t wait for his next book to come out), have distracted the country away from what Obama really wants them to discuss - health care reform.</p>
<p>With all the exploitation he has perpetrated, he’s coming out of this more than whole. Want to bet his next book sells better than the previous one?</p>
<p>Not sure. In my book, he does not come off looking so good.<br>
As a Cambridge resident, I don’t like living in a community where African-Americans and the police are at odds with each other. I have posted before that I personally know some African-Americans whose right to be where they were (in a particular case, Harvard students sitting on the steps of a Harvard dorm playing guitars) have been challenged, so police bias is not unknown; as is suspicion of police bias in the African-American community. I would hope that both sides work together to improve relations, not worsen them.</p>
<p>I think the thing that bothered me was when Professor Gates said that he knew the officer “had a narrative in his head.” Since there was no way for him to know if the officer had just had the best sex of his life or had just put his dog to sleep, it seems to me that he was the one with a narrative at the ready.</p>
<p>I don’t really understand why the fact that Officer Crowley attempted to resuscitate Len Bias, as the officer on the scene, has any logical bearing whatsoever (one way or the other) on the question of whether his actions towards Prof. Gates reflected racism, individual and/or institutional. I mean, please. He was doing his job. Does anyone seriously believe that at that time and place in history, even a racist police officer would have risked his career by <em>refusing</em> to resuscitate a black man? Would have just turned around and left him to die? (“Oh no, not me, I’m not touching that guy! He’s black!”) That was a completely different situation from this one, and sheds no light at all upon it. (And it certainly would never be admissible in a court of law to establish any kind of “pattern” of non-racism.)</p>
<p>BTW, I have no idea what Crowley’s conscious motivations were. All I’m saying is that the previous incident that people seem to think is so meaningful is actually meaningless.</p>
<p>Let’s see…I don’t have all the facts, I’m probably biased towards one party so I think I can weigh in here. I want to award some grades:</p>
<p>The Professor: Grade - C. Gates gets an average grade because he acted like a typical arrogant jerk. He could have stopped at his own front door, yet he determined to follow the cop outside and seek his pound of flesh from the civil servant. The good professor should know enough that when a cop starts focusing on him and giving first one, then two (display handcuffs at two) warnings you just may get arrested at the third. Cops follow a pattern like this because they are prepping you for trial.</p>
<p>The Cop: Grade - B+. The sergeant, a 20-year veteran, is a field supervisor and has undoubtedly encountered more than his share of arrogant jerks in his career who want to have him fired or disciplined for doing his job. He has likely counseled many other officers in the approach to such events and has been successful to survive with an unblemished record for so many years. If he’s lucky, he’ll get to retirement in the next few years without suffering from stress-related disease or stopping a bullet fired at him by yet another arrogant jerk. I’d give him an “A”, but in consideration of the very remote chance he’s a closet racist that has escaped detection all these many years of public service the professor’s bile docks him a half point. He really earns it back for being under control during an in-progress call with unknown facts where he likely was experiencing an adrenaline dump, but we’ll give the other party his due just for the fun of it. </p>
<p>The President of the United States:
**Grade - F. ** If anyone was unforgivably stupid here it is our new president. Why on earth would he want for a second to comment - on national TV - if he does not know ALL the facts? Even if he knew what he thought were all the facts he should have held his tongue. As the chief law enforcement officer, smearing a street cop and his department in a fit of pique is beyond belief. He should have remained above the fray while he browbeats conservative Democrats into voting for socialized medicine.
Wow, what a dummy. :(</p>
<p>He was asked a question: he answered it. He also happens to be a friend of Gates.</p>
<p>As I’ve posted elsewhere, I think Gates should have been more circumspect and indeed appreciative that a police officer investigated a possible b&e in his house. But Crowley was wrong to arrest him for disorderly conduct.</p>
<p>There are too many criminals and thugs working as police officers. I believe that minorities really have limited trust in these people who are suppose to be peace officers.</p>
<p>Oh, yeah, like it’s some innocent office conversation in the hallway. </p>
<p>He is using the gravitas of the Presidency in inappropriate ways (thereby diluting it)- stepping into a local law enforcement matter all the while describing incorrectly why Gates was arrested. </p>
<p>“It’s not appropriate for me to comment on that here.”, not “well, I’d better answer that because I was asked.”</p>
<p>Marite, with the small exception that I still believe someone such as Prof. Gates should never have lost his temper (nor the equanimity and magnanimity becoming his stature in society and intellect,) I could not agree more with you. It was a huge misunderstanding that should have never taken place. </p>
<p>The most sordid element of this entire affair is the amazing desire and intent for observers to push the issue to an even more divisive situation along black versus white lines. That is where the real shame can be found.</p>
<p>Seriously… why do you suppose he answered in the way he did?</p>
<p>His answer was the sort of spin and accusation that starts discussions and Obama’s certainly a smart enough politician to have brushed off a question he didn’t want to address.</p>
<p>Myself, I lean towards the… “distracted the country away from what Obama really wants them to discuss - health care reform”… explanation.</p>
<p>"I think Gates should have been more circumspect and indeed appreciative that a police officer investigated a possible b&e in his house. But Crowley was wrong to arrest him for disorderly conduct. "</p>
<p>and the charges were dropped. As many charges are dropped in retrospect after facts are gathered and evidence analyzed… If Gates were a white male homeowner, we would not be hearing about this nonsense. </p>
<p>To explain further, if a white guy got grumpy in his own home about being questioned (for good reason) and asked for ID and then got rather rude, loud and in the cop’s face, and ended up being arrested, we would not hear about it. The charges later would most likely be dropped on lack of grounds and that would be the end of the story.</p>
<p>Well, the problem is that many of you folks ostensibly believe that meaning exists only, or at least primarily, in words. It is a false belief. If as a neighbor I approach any reasonable person, for example, and with a stern voice demand that they “step-out-side, please”, they are going to feel most threatened, and form a narrative in their head that something is terribly wrong. They may even suspect that I mean them harm, especially if given a certain history. This is because meaning exists is such things as body posture, tone, facial expression and general demeanor. Contrariwise, if I am smiling and speak the exact same words, the neighbor may easily come outside, and even anticipate some positive experience.</p>
<p>Gates has already said that what first kicked off this fracas was the way in which the cop commanded him to step outside. It was at that point that he felt “in danger”, as he said, and this is why he was reticent to step outside. Had that cop treated Gates as he would have any white guy in the same circumstance, this episode never would have happened.</p>
<p>The cop is indeed a racist, but of the sort similar to the vast majority of Americans. His racism is so common, operates so frequently, and is so widespread, he literally cannot see it, though he is racist to the core of his lily white soul.</p>
<p>He does not understand that he is a racist. Many here also cannot understand this. It is the victims of this racism that see it plainly:</p>
<p>*Not surprisingly, most physicians did not admit to any racial biases explicitly. However, on the implicit measures of bias (IATs), most nonblack physicians demonstrated some degree of bias favoring whites over blacks. Participants’ scores on the race preference IAT showed a range of implicit race bias similar to previous experiments on nonphysicians.21,26 The new cooperativeness IATs were normally distributed and somewhat correlated with the well-studied race preference IAT, suggesting that they measure different but related components of race bias.</p>
<p>The problem with this sort of racism is that when victims declare it, the perpetrators scoff because they cannot see it. They are still racists nevertheless, even if they never wish to hear the term again, and even if they shut their ears to it.</p>
<p>“Had that cop treated Gates as he would have any white guy in the same circumstance, this episode never would have happened.”</p>
<p>Amazing that you have such insight into this officer’s behavior that you would know how he behaves with white guys. Are you as knowledgeable of his treatment of Latino women or Asian teenagers?</p>
<p>Perhaps your pre-disposition in your belief of how a “white” police officer treats anyone is the real reason this is being discussed as a racial profiling at all.</p>
<p>Well, xiggi, I can understand being irritable after a very long flight and being quite taken aback about being challenged about one’s right to be in one’s own home. Like our POTUS, I don’t know all the facts (and does any one besides Gates and Crowley?), but I think both sides over-reacted.</p>
<p>Now Crowley is being sensible and conciliatory:
<p>I hope that Gates will extend the olive branch as well. I am sure that the mayor does not want a summer of race tensions. The one thing that is helping keep things calm, given the unemployment rate, is that it’s been raining and raining and raining.</p>
<p>Are you kidding? He was taken out of his own home in handcuffs, booked, and photographed. </p>
<p>He came out on top?</p>
<p>When Sgt. Crowley is removed from his home in cuffs, booked photographed, and fingerprinted, THEN Gates can be said to have “come out on top.”</p>
<p>I repeat that anyone who doesn’t admit that black men have good reason to be wary of/in fear of cops in disingenuous. Anyone who doesn’t think that Gates’ reaction to Crowley was informed by that is, at best, a fool. Yeah, sure, perhaps Gates was “guilty” of “Don’t you know who I am?” syndrome. BFD. Isn’t there SOME point at which a black person should expect to be treated like a person who is assumed to be “normal”?</p>
<p>I am GLAD that Obama spoke forcefully. It’s time.</p>