Certainly Not

At 5:49 a.m., EDT (8/24/14), it was reported on USA Today that the ‘Support Darren Wilson’ fund had amassed nearly $235,000. The fund received so many donations, just over 5,900, that organizers had to stop accepting them. They then opened up again for a new round and by the time of the article, they had already raised another $100,000. By the time of this writing, 9:02, CDT (8/24/14), the latest round has already made it over $138,000 on the backs of 3,000 more donations.

There is a lot to unpack from this development in the ongoing fallout from the shooting death of Michael Brown. Somebody’s wall must have a Pulitzer shaped void, right? But I’m not that person. I’m only going to ask one of the myriad questions that should be asked: Why would someone actually donate to this campaign? I don’t mean that in the rhetorical sense. I want to know why, with all the information we the public have at our disposal, would someone donate money to this of all causes?

The most obvious reason is that you know Darren Wilson intimately. If you are a member of his family or a very close friend or associate, you might be moved by love and trust to accept Mr. Wilson’s version of events. It may be the case that his version is rather convincing and you as a close relation would be presented with this information that is not otherwise available. Even if it wasn’t a particularly compelling account, one’s personal ties and first-hand understanding of his character might lead you to suspect that any inconsistencies are not enough to dissuade you from your support. Maybe his version of events is really sketchy but you choose to hope for and operate under the supposition of his innocence. These various dispositions are at wildly different levels of intellectual honesty, but in none of these circumstances would I fault someone for remaining by the man’s side. Even in the last case, I cannot say that I could abandon my little brother or sister, my father or mother, or one of my closest friends in similar circumstances. Loyalty may be a sin in some situations, but not one for which I could damn someone.

Even if Darren Wilson came from an incredibly large family and/or enjoyed the support of a ludicrously high number of intense and intimate personal relationships, we can assume that a majority of those nearly 9,000 donations were not from the aforementioned group.

It is known that some donations were received at the behest of the efforts of a KKK group, admittedly one that was later disavowed by the leadership as being fringe. Accepting for a moment that any group can be considered fringe by someone whose title is ‘Imperial Wizard’, it is certainly true that openly and explicitly racist folk have been donating as well. You needn’t spend very much time online to see that stock in virulently racist statements is in something of a bull market. The ‘Support Darren Wilson’ fund itself was forced to shut down its comments section because of the deluge of bigotry. We must temper this with an understanding that the internet is often little more than a megaphone set to the lips of the most vocal, rather than the most numerous. A number of these comments could have been trolls, stirring the pot because they are so radically disconnected that the pain and suffering inherent in all this doesn’t register with them. Still, we can assume that at least a portion of the donations were from folks who mean these things when say them, write them, and think them, but it likely doesn’t account for all the rest of the donations.

Perhaps you think the deck is stacked against Mr. Wilson. Perhaps you think that his chances of receiving a fair trial are diminished in some way and that by providing your assistance he may be able to retain the best counsel to clear his name. Perhaps you don’t know whether or not he did it, but feel that without adequate funding from outside sources, the truth will not come out. This is the second of our patently ridiculous reasons to fund the campaign. Sorry I didn’t spell out that blatant racism was the first, but if you needed me to tell you that, I suspect a brief Medium post is not the sort of thing that’ll change your mind.

If that is your concern, let me dispel your worries. We’ll just assume that for whatever reason, the Boys in Blue won’t support one of their own, despite the evidence to the contrary. Mr. Wilson will still in all likelihood receive a thoroughly zealous defense. The sort of zealous defense that helps to create a massive discrepancy in the rate of conviction between police defendants and the general public to the tune of around thirty percent. Even when they are convicted, the difference in the rate of incarceration between police defendants and the general public is another thirty percent. All this information should put your weary mind at ease. But let’s say he really falls through the cracks. The legal system, which seems to consistently favor his chances, somehow manages to shit the bed on this one. Well, you can comfort yourself in knowing that the average length of sentences is also far lower for police defendants over the general public. So if you were of that number, don’t worry: you don’t need to donate one cent more. His chances are quite good. In fact, given the statistics, it would probably be mighty white of ya to throw some donations to the opposing side, to help even out the playing field a little. Which would be startlingly apropos for you guys.

Oh my, I may have tipped my hand there folks. This last group I’m gonna talk about is white people. Actually, all these groups I’ve talked about are basically just white people. If you doubt this, might I turn your attention to the survey that asked whether Michael Brown’s death was an isolated incident or part of the pattern of violence under which black men suffer? Forty percent of white people indicated that it was an isolated incident; six percent of black people agreed. Thirty five percent of white people thought it was part of the pattern; seventy six percent of black people agreed. That not enough for ya? You can go over to the ‘Support Darren Wilson’ fund itself and peruse their photo collection. The racial mixture of the album is a shade darker than blank canvas with more animals declaring their support for Mr. Wilson than black people. So yeah, don’t try to squirm outta this one. This second half is the one that you especially need to hear.

This last group are those white people who watch TV. They read the internet. They don’t know anyone involved. They haven’t come across a leaked confidential document. They have no more information regarding the event than anyone else in the category of John Q. Publick. Lastly, and importantly, they don’t actively think of themselves as biased in anyway when it comes to race.

So if these people support Mr. Wilson, upon what basis do they do so? The only reason left is to hold to the belief that the evidence known by the public is sufficiently incriminating of Mr. Brown that blame can legitimately be assigned. What is this evidence?

There are a number of eye witnesses. all reporting different versions of events. On the aggregate, we can safely say only a few things: 1)Mr. Brown was walking the street with a friend, 2) was stopped by police, 3) had some variety of altercation with an officer who was in the vehicle, 4) Mr. Wilson was injured in some capacity, likely in the face, 5) Mr. Wilson fired his gun while in the vehicle. At this point the accounts get very muddy, some indicating that Mr. Brown having once run away quickly doubled back to attack the officer (an account I have trouble imagining) and some indicating that after unsuccessfully escaping Mr. Brown raised his open hands and requested that the officer cease shooting, at which point the officer shot him repeatedly. The police have cast aspersions on the character of Michael Brown, but also have stated that Wilson was not aware of the purported cigar robbery Brown was posthumously accused of committing. The police report does not give an account of the shooting. The family’s pathologist who performed an autopsy on Mr. Brown’s body said that he was shot six times, that the injuries sustained could be consistent with any of the eye witness accounts available, and that the fatal shot was to the top of the head, indicating that Mr. Brown was bent forward.

In all, there is not anywhere near enough evidence to suggest that any one version of events is correct. The entire event is clouded by hearsay, alarmingly blank police reports, and inconclusive forensic evidence. So in the absence of credible evidence pointing to one or another account, what is it that would compel you to donate? You aren’t privy to anything about the case not publicly known. You can’t be worried about Mr. Wilson’s chances to avoid a miscarriage of justice. You certainly aren’t a racist; not the frothing-at-the-mouth variety. You’re not a racist in any way, right? You don’t operate with an internal, possibly latent bias, that would drive you to assume guilt to one party. Certainly not.

You may feel that I’ve implied that you are a racist just now. In fact, I have. But I submit that I only did so to serve a purpose: When you realized what I was doing in the final few paragraphs, how did you feel? Did you feel attacked? Did you think that I didn’t have the evidence, no matter how many sources I cited, to claim something about you that you knew to be untrue? Did you think these implications were unfair? Did you feel silenced before you spoke, as if anything you could say in response would be dismissed or ignored outright? When I made the case that something was deeply, perhaps inherently wrong with you as a person because of some assumed motive, did you want to withdraw and not read further? Did you just shake your head and wonder how I arrived at these conclusions without ever having met you? Were you convinced that I would likely never treat you fairly or with respect?

I don’t know that tragedy is ever mitigated by the good that can come from it, and the macabre dance of anger and recrimination around this boy’s death can only be described as such. Perhaps all we can hope to do is learn enough about each other that it takes us just a second longer to make a snap judgement. Perhaps that’s enough.