A Cop Killed a Black Man—Then Things Got ‘Ugly’
Some might say that the turn toward ugliness occurred in the afternoon, when a police officer fatally shot a black man.
‘We Are Criminalizing Transparency to Protect Illegitimate Uses of Power’
“Public safety agencies…perceive any threat to their own political power as analogous to a threat to public safety. And that exactly, of course, precisely gets the relationship wrong, because the people who are capturing police violence on video, they are the ones enhancing public safety here.”
‘We Have to Have Disability as Part of Our Discussion’
“The media will talk about someone with mental illness, but it’s often in a way that blames the mental illness for the eventual force used against them.”
David Perry on Disabilities and Police Violence, Harvey Wasserman on Nuclear vs. Renewables
The disability community is routinely marginalized in the media, making it hard to address the frequency with which law enforcement’s use of force involves people with disabilities.
‘The Public Is Viewed Not as Someone to Be Helped, but as an Enemy to Be Contained’
“What’s needed is something that really asks, why have we so dramatically expanded the role for police, and why are we so heavily targeting poor and minority communities for this kind of intensive and invasive policing?”
Alex Vitale on Overpolicing, Cristina Jiménez on Immigration Ruling
Media insist there is “nationwide soul-searching” going on on the problem of racist police brutality. Certainly there is pain and anger, but when it comes time to talk about how to change things, corporate media don’t seem to have a great deal to say.
Copspeak: 7 Ways Journalists Use Police Jargon to Obscure the Truth
“Copspeak” — the jargon used by police departments — is internalized by journalists covering police violence, and it affects the public’s perception of crime and police brutality.
The Busted Theory of ‘Broken Windows’ Still Has Media Defenders
Broken Windows enjoyed, for many years, a reputation as public safety gospel and the miracle solution to New York’s crime-ridden past. But now a report by the New York Police Department’s inspector general’s office has undermined the premise of the city’s famed crime-fighting philosophy
‘Minority Communities Bear the Brunt of Police Abuses’
“Justice Sotomayor takes issue not just with the result in the Strief opinion, but with the results in a range of Fourth Amendment opinions…. The Fourth Amendment hasn’t been interpreted in a manner that allows for courts to respond to the realities of policing in minority communities.”
AlterNet Quotes Naureckas on the Power of Police Leaks
Max Blumenthal and Sarah Lazare, writing for AlterNet about the refusal of Orlando police to release 911 transcripts from the Pulse massacre, quoted FAIR’s Jim Naureckas on the power of police leaks.
‘They Place These Kids on a Superpredator Pedestal’
“To the extent that there is violence, community members wanted an approach that really steered people away and got at root causes. And they were continually ignored, over and over. And so what they got instead from the city was a giant raid, because that’s what the city understands, that’s what the police department understands.”
NYPD’s Arrests of Citizen Journalists Should Spark Outrage
Last week, New York City police officers arrested four well-known activists for filming them. Copwatchers—people who regularly film and document police activity—have often been targeted by cops who don’t want to be recorded, despite reminders that recording police interactions is legal in the city. While legal protections for filming police are still unclear in some […]
Police and Media Agree: Cops Just Need to Be Nicer
The police reform conversation, pushed into the national consciousness through mass protests and acts of civil disobedience by everyday people, was steered toward the theme of “community policing” by establishment figures—with the help of the media.
WaPo Tallies Police Killings—but Holds Back Some of the Numbers That Count
The Washington Post’s tally of fatal police shootings in 2015 is a journalistic accomplishment. But it’s hard to escape the feeling that the Post framed its report to minimize its remarkable findings.
‘The Tendency Is to Just Publish the Police Blotter’
“We have in this society, around issues of race, an extraordinary ability to know things and not know things at the same time…. I think journalists have a critical role in sort of disabling…those strategies of denial.”
Jamie Kalven on the Laquan McDonald Cover-Up
The video that belied the official story of the police killing of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald, along with an autopsy that also showed police’s initial story to be false, eventually came to light through the work of journalists—but not mainstream journalists;
Abuse Charges Against a Former Cop Are Disturbing—as Is the Lack of Media Interest
Daniel Holtzclaw evidently selected his victims because he believed no one would care about them. Media shouldn’t prove him right.
‘Reliance on Police Cannot Be Consistent With What We Want to Happen in Public Schools’
“The moment this becomes a law enforcement issue, that becomes the moment where the student’s future is placed at risk. And that means our institutions are underserving students.”
‘Laws Are Incredibly Deferential to Police Using Lethal Violence’
“There is a very hard-wired tendency among Americans in general, and liberals in particular, to think that even when things are going wrong, that the law is good and fundamentally on our side. That the law is synonymous with justice.”
Chase Madar on Prosecuting Police
It looks unlikely that the officer, Timothy Loehmann, who shot 12-year-old Tamir Rice will face any prosecution at all for the killing. If the justice system won’t bring justice, what could?
