In watching what has unfolded with the widely admired Harvard Historian Henry Louis Gates or Skip Gates as he is also known, I am surprised yet thrilled by the shock and awe that has amassed.
For us lesser known black folks this is not an event that we are not familiar with. In fact if you have been following the coverage almost every commentator of color has spoken about their own experiences with racial profiling and the over zealous machismo of the National Police Fraternity, no doubt even law enforcement officers of color have not escaped from the nefarious clutches.
Whether or not I believe that Skip Gates’ case was as bad as others that I know of or have experienced personally is not relevant. It is important that it happened.
His incident and fame as forced a nation which believes in the false notion of a post racial society to acknowledge that it doesn’t exist. It has forced well to do and affluent scholars and professionals of color to remember that their prestige does not shield them from some of the perils that face the less fortunate. It has illustrated that racial profiling is not simply an issue for inner city residents, criminals or youngsters with baggy clothes. It had caused the President to have to speak out in a very direct tone with regards to the actions of a police officer for the first time in history (as far as I know).
It goes with out saying that people of color are subject to events much worse that this on an everyday basis. However the fact that it has happened to someone so prominent will start a dialogue across the country, and will even spark a documentary produced by Gates himself.
Ultimately what it shows is if more people of distinction and name recognition find themselves treated with the callous treatment that your average person of color receives perhaps we will find ourselves straying away from rhetoric and actually sparking action and eventually change.
B Greene
Tags: Harvard, law enforcement, linkedin, Obama, police, politics, racial profiling, racism
