Going out the way I came in
As I was thinking about my last post, I thought I would write about my wonderful experience in this class. Professor D gave me the confidence to open up and write about whatever was on my mind and I did exactly that. With that being said, I feel like it’s only right to finish my last post talking about how black people have been railroaded in America. This time the story comes out of Manhattan Beach. In my WP3, I talked about my experience with the police out there but seeing these stories confirm my suspicions. Black people get harassed for no reasons for other than being black.
Black people are 120 times more likely to be arrested my MBPD than whites, 120 times more! That means exactly what I’ve been thinking, they don’t want us there. It’s a beach city, they have good bars, good restaurants and the vibe is good so why should blacks be punished for wanting to have a good time? Did I already say that we don’t belong there? Former Laker Matt Barnes had a run in with the MBPD and the story was very interesting. Matt had a warrant for for failing to appear in court for a traffic ticket, thought he had gotten it taken care of and went out to dinner with his girlfriend. A MBPD officer who was aware of the warrant saw Matt park his car and go to a restaurant. The officer waited two hours in an alley for Matt to come out, he then ran up to him and arrested him without telling him the reason. Matt then attempted to hand his car keys to his girlfriend and they charged him with resisting arrest. This isn’t the typical behavior of officers but when dealing with a black person all rules seem to go out the window.
We’ve heard many stories of the police department mistreating blacks but what about the land owners that were mistreated as well? Bruce’s Beach was a beach resort in the city of Manhattan Beach, California, that was owned by and operated for African Americans. It provided the African American community with opportunities unavailable at other beach areas because of segregation. The Bruce’s bought the land in 1912 and ran a popular lodge, cafe and dancehall. A few more Black people bought cottages near and they started a small community. The White neighbors didn’t like the fact that they had Black people as their neighbors so they started harassing them. They put up fake 10 minute parking signs to deter out of towners from coming in and made them walk over a half of mile to the cafe. The KKK even burned their main deck and even burned a nearby home of a Black resident hoping these actions would make them move. When that didn’t work, city officials condemned the neighborhood in 1924 and seized more than two dozen properties through eminent domain. The reason, they said, was an urgent need for a public park.
As of today, the piece of land known as Bruce’s Beach is worth 75 million. That’s a piece of land and millions of dollars of generational wealth that was snatched from a Black Family, not to mention the properties of the other families that were stripped as well. When we talk about the wealth gap, we have to acknowledge the fact that Blacks have been stripped of their land on more than one occasion. A few years before Bruce’s Beach was seized, the Tulsa Massacre took place.
African Americans had created a self-sufficient prosperous business district. The term Black Wall Street was used until the Tulsa race riot of 1921. The Tulsa race massacre took place on May 31 and June 1, 1921, when mobs of white residents, many of them deputized and given weapons by city officials, attacked black residents and businesses and destroyed the majority of the district. These acts helped keep us down financially and still have lingering affects til this day. If Bruce’s Beach was never taken, if Tulsa wasn’t burned down to the ground, if we got our 40 acres and a mule, the playing fields would have been much different.
Back to the Manhattan Beach Police Department, the harassment towards Black people isn’t going to stop, it’s too deeply rooted in history. If Bruce’s Beach was never taken, the population wouldn’t be under 1% and it would be a lot more diverse. They didn’t want that back then and they don’t want that now and that’s why we fight for equality everyday.
WORKS CITED
Twitter: Manhattan Beach
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3sorCAFQOqc
TMZ: https://www.tmz.com/2012/08/03/matt-barnes-manhattan-beach-cop-lurked-for-two-hours-before-arrest/
