Sad to say, he’s got a point. And no one is questioning her moves or body language, her background, etc etc. Indeed like black victims of police violence, she was a peaceful soul — a yoga teacher. Tamir rice was a child. Philando worked at a school and was driving home with his family. No one was an arch criminal, a murderer, a fugitive hell bent on staying out of prison, a terrorist gang member eager to ambush police. So there is that tie.
The only silver lining to Diamond’s killing — and it came out when Philando Castile’s widow visited with Diamond’s husband — is that it will focus on the more narrow issue of training. Callow yet authority- drunk morons, many straight from the military, cannot be put out on the street. Police academies are little more than brief vocational high schools now, conducted in unused community college space(even in some big cities). Cops get all of this hardware and leeway, yet nothing to tune what’s between their ears. This is despite all of the law and order talk from conservative politicians in state legislatures, on the Hill, in the Trump White House.
No this, does nothing to address the racist application of that force, or how white America treats black victims, but I’m encouraged on a micro level that the training and recruitment aspect now is right in front of white America’s eyes.
