Racial Profiling and Professor Skip Gates

[Yellow#5]

The Gates incident (now almost 2 weeks old) raises an interesting question in my mind.

First, let me say that I am a lawyer and during law school and for a short time after graduation, I worked for the Public Defender. I do believe that racial profiling is a serious problem and a statistical fact. However, the facts as they emerged in Skip Gate's case don't fit the typical pattern of racial profiling, specifically, the officers did not chose to investigate based on their own whim, rather, they were responding to a call. There is a question of whether or not once the police arrived and found a black man in the house, whether they treated him differently because of his race (and the much more subtle analysis, did Gate's own experience with Police or his understanding of how Police treat black men, regardless of his own experience, make him feel more persecuted). These questions are all very interesting and important from a social/ cultural point of view, but from a legal standpoint, the 4th Amendment violation of being arrested in your own home for "public disturbance" is the paramount issue in my mind here. Racism is much harder to criminalize and prove, but 4th Amendment violations are much more cut and dry.

Assume for a moment that this was NOT an incident of racism. (I realize this is not something that can be proven or disproven, but let's just assume it for now). Or rather, let's assume that there is not enough evidence to allege this was a racially motivated arrest.

Is the black community and all of it's prominent members only prepared to object to civil rights violations if they are based on racism? What if they are arrested in violation of their 4th Amendment rights in their own home because an officer takes offense at something said, and goes beyond his statutory discretion to arrest? Is this not worthy of a civil rights law suit in they eyes of a Black Harvard Professor, because it is NOT a racial issue?

In my opinion, Professor Gates has a good argument that his 4th Amendment Rights were violated, because he was falsely arrested in his own home after he co-operated with the police investigation and showed TWO forms of ID. Ironically, after Gates raised the claim of "racial profiling" and then the issue snowballed in the media, Gates decided to back-off of talk of lawsuits, etc., never discussed his basic 4th Amendment rights that were violated nearly as vociferously as the racial issues. He, in effect, chose to forfeit his claim to the rights of all citizens in favor of litigating in the media the much narrower right to be free from discrimination. Is this really a positive message to send to the African American community? That African-Americans should only demand their civil rights up to a point? and once they cross out of the territory of "rights violated based on race" and into that smaller subsection of civil rights offenses against African-Americans that are NOT race based, they should not fight for those rights the same way a white American would?

I'd love to hear from any African-American Studies majors on this issue.

[wantaphd]

As a black woman, there are so many issues I could address here, but I will try to limit myself to the question you posed. I think you are correct that by focusing on racial profiling, Gates neglected the larger issue of the violation of his 4th amendment rights. And it does send the wrong message to the black community, and for that matter, any community of people who tend to focus only on the issue of race when much larger legal issues are at stake. However, I believe that Gates focused on race because he realizes that race relations in this country are still pretty terrible. Lots of folks tend to think that just because Obama is president that institutionalized racism and racial profiling disappeared when he swore his oath of office. It didn't. Obviously things are better than they were 40 years ago, but we still have a long way to go.

I also think Gates suffered from what many a Harvard prof would suffer from if he or she were arrested in his or her own home: a case of righteous indignation that comes along with being part of the academic elite. Likewise, I'm hard pressed to believe that the police did not know who he was when they arrived at his home. I mean, how many black professors at Harvard live in Gates' neighborhood?

Thanks for bringing up the topic. I read the Gates thread on the Chronicle and I was dismayed at how much racism exists in academe, but then again, I wasn't all that surprised.

[Yellow#5]

It's a problem, I think, because the objective, provable facts seem to show that there was a 4th Amendment violation because of an unlawful arrest. Why is Gates imposing a harder standard of proof on himself? Racism is hard to prove, but false arrest is easier. Here you have a 911 tape where a cop radios in, says the guy lives here, his name is Gates -- Send backup! That's frankly outrageous, and sadly, people of every race suffer from this kind of police intimidation, so it would be nice if someone with the means and access to the media, like Professor Gates, would take up this issue for all citizens. Does Gates have to chose whether he wants to pursue the rights of all black men or all americans? If so, why?

While I think it's important for scholars like Gates to think about and advocate about issues that affect African-American culture specifically, is he in effect forfeiting his claim to the rights guaranteed to all citizens in the 4th Amendment? Furthermore, when Americans are sectioned off like this, where only whites will defend their basic 4th Amendment rights, but blacks and latinos will only press the issue if they can prove racial discrimination, doesn't it weaken the citizenry by dividing us? If we don't all fight for our ordinary 4th Amendment rights, isn't it easier to errode those fundemental rights?

Now we have a high profile arrest that everyone should be saying is a police-state, totally over the line arrest, YET many groups out there, who are usually so on the look out for "big government" are getting drawn in to this argument about whether the cop was racist or not racist, feeling sympathy for the white cop "wrongly accused of racism" and ignoring the simple 4th amendment issue, abandoning their guard posts that no matter what, police should not be allowed to arrest any citizen of any color in their house without a warrant.

[Minnesotan]

I mean, how many black professors at Harvard live in Gates' neighborhood?

There's the thing that troubles me about all of this: it was his neighbor who called the cops. Wouldn't this guy, if he was any sort of responsible community figure, be known by name, face, or reputation by his immediate neighbors, let alone the community as a whole? I guess, if you don't take the time to participate in the community, you shouldn't get all high and mighty with the cops if they drop by to ask you why you're breaking into a house.

Nonetheless, this has little bearing on the legal issues. It merely makes me think the professor might want to moderate his indignation, considering he could have avoided this whole fiasco by introducing himself to his neighbors when he moved in.

[kfed2020]

There's the thing that troubles me about all of this: it was his neighbor who called the cops. Wouldn't this guy, if he was any sort of responsible community figure, be known by name, face, or reputation by his immediate neighbors, let alone the community as a whole? I guess, if you don't take the time to participate in the community, you shouldn't get all high and mighty with the cops if they drop by to ask you why you're breaking into a house.

Nonetheless, this has little bearing on the legal issues. It merely makes me think the professor might want to moderate his indignation, considering he could have avoided this whole fiasco by introducing himself to his neighbors when he moved in.

I don't think it's fair to argue off the bat that it's his fault for his neighbors not recognizing who he is; that feels akin to blaming a rape victim for wearing a short skirt. It could be true that he's not involved in the local community. Or it could be true that he is involved and his neighbors are ignorant. We don't really know which it is, but neither seems sufficient justification.

I know that there were times at night when I forgot my swipe card to my dorm and, on occasion, people would hesitate to swipe me in. I was very active in my dorm's social life, mind you. My fault for forgetting my swipe card, but everyone does that; is it my fault that they hesitated, too?

Either way... It's hard for me to believe that a fundraiser at the university's alumni magazine doesn't know which university celebrities live on her street. It would seem to me that this level of familiarity is part of her job. Plus? Bragging rights. I would know if one of my neighbors was a dude who was on Oprah all the time -- was a pal of the President, no less.

Also, if I'd seen someone breaking into a house with a ton of luggage, I would've gone out to investigate a little before calling the police if I were really that suspicious. Burglars don't often intend to move in and stay awhile.

[Yellow#5]

If you listen to the 911 call that has been widely reported in the news, the "neighbor" was someone who worked in the neighborhood, not someone who lived there. She did mention the luggage and even the fact that the people might have lived there and were only having trouble with their key, because they had to "barge" their way in (an odd word choice she kept using).

Still, I think the neighbor did the right thing in calling and expressing her concerns, as well as her caution that the person "breaking in" may have lived there. It was the police who acted inappropriately.

My main observation in posting this thread though, is that it seems to me that, by degrees, in order to explore the racial overtones that might be lurking in his treatment, Professor Gates has either been distracted, or has voluntarily stepped away from discussing his basic 4th Amendment rights, which in my opinion were violated.

If every minority and minority leader feels they have to make this choice, (talking about their 4th Amendment rights in terms of objective procedure OR raising awareness of possible racial overtones) does it fragment the general citizenries rights along racial lines? In otherwords, do black men have to prove the more difficult argument that they were arrested because they were black, yet any other citizen only has to argue they were arrested improperly because there was not sufficient grounds to arrest? In the former argument, the burden of proof is on the black man, in the latter, the police have the burden of proving the arrest was proper.

In other words, is Gates put in a position when he takes his case to the public where he to chose from among his various identities? Black man/senior citizen/american citizen. Does he have to chose one and only one of these identities when he argues his case that he was treated unfairly by the police?

[kfed2020]

If you listen to the 911 call that has been widely reported in the news, the "neighbor" was someone who worked in the neighborhood, not someone who lived there. She did mention the luggage and even the fact that the people might have lived there and were only having trouble with their key, because they had to "barge" their way in (an odd word choice she kept using).

Still, I think the neighbor did the right thing in calling and expressing her concerns, as well as her caution that the person "breaking in" may have lived there. It was the police who acted inappropriately.

My main observation in posting this thread though, is that it seems to me that, by degrees, in order to explore the racial overtones that might be lurking in his treatment, Professor Gates has either been distracted, or has voluntarily stepped away from discussing his basic 4th Amendment rights, which in my opinion were violated.

If every minority and minority leader feels they have to make this choice, (talking about their 4th Amendment rights in terms of objective procedure OR raising awareness of possible racial overtones) does it fragment the general citizenries rights along racial lines? In otherwords, do black men have to prove the more difficult argument that they were arrested because they were black, yet any other citizen only has to argue they were arrested improperly because there was not sufficient grounds to arrest? In the former argument, the burden of proof is on the black man, in the latter, the police have the burden of proving the arrest was proper.

In other words, is Gates put in a position when he takes his case to the public where he to chose from among his various identities? Black man/senior citizen/american citizen. Does he have to chose one and only one of these identities when he argues his case that he was treated unfairly by the police?

Good. I haven't listened to the 911 tape yet, but I'm glad she acknowledged he could've lived there, and I thank you for pointing that out.

I think you pose an interesting, difficult question about Skip's response. 4th amendment violations are a big deal, and few people seem to be talking it, including Skip himself.

My instinct is that the bigger trauma for him right now, and maybe the bigger trauma more generally, is the feeling that despite his many successes it's been proven for him, somewhat forcefully, that he hasn't transcended the expectations of his race. As in, the range of acts expected of black men.

It ultimately wouldn't matter how justified the woman felt she was in calling the cops; 'success' for many black Americans (and especially the black bourgeois) is at least partially defined by the expectation that people won't randomly call the cops on you, that people around you will recognize that you're not violent or a thug, or however you want to describe it -- however problematic that desire may be. I think this incident destroyed that illusion for Professor Gates; this, I think, is what his instinctive reaction would be.

So, to maybe answer your question, I don't think it's a matter of black men having to prove it was a matter of race so much as this is their instinct. Especially the black middle class. Even when/if they're in the wrong.

[Yellow#5]

I think your comment is very good, and gets at the heart of Gate's subjective experience.

My instinct is that the bigger trauma for him right now, and maybe the bigger trauma more generally, is the feeling that despite his many successes it's been proven for him, somewhat forcefully, that he hasn't transcended the expectations of his race. As in, the range of acts expected of black men.

It ultimately wouldn't matter how justified the woman felt she was in calling the cops; 'success' for many black Americans (and especially the black bourgeois) is at least partially defined by the expectation that people won't randomly call the cops on you, that people around you will recognize that you're not violent or a thug, or however you want to describe it -- however problematic that desire may be. I think this incident destroyed that illusion for Professor Gates; this, I think, is what his instinctive reaction would be.

I had the same impression, that in the moment of the arrest, particularly, he had a very reasonable reaction based on his subjective experience. I think this subjective experience is very important to him, in fact a very important social issue generally. Many talking heads in the news have accused him of "playing the race card" but what does a well respected Harvard prof. have to gain by doing that here? Clearly, he honestly believed that he wouldn't get a fair shake from the cops, that no matter how successful he is the police are not there to protect him and his property, and that he's still somehow outside the protection of law enforcement, rather at their mercy.

The fact still remains, this deep trauma is a cultural one, but not a legal one. He can't litigate this in court to defend his rights, because there is no one particular person in this situation he can point to as responsible. On the other hand, Gates does have recourse under the 4th Amendment to sue and restore his sense of having full rights, but he doesn't seem interested in claiming them and I really think the inability to do so is also rooted in this emotional trauma Gates is working through here.

Gates is a thought leader within the African-American community and very conversant in issues like racial profiling, but he seems to have a less thorough understanding of the more basic Constitutional principles in which they are rooted, or at least, he seems to be less than automatic in applying them to himself. If he were a white professor arrested in his house, his knee jerk objection in the media would undoubtedly be "you violated my 4th Am. rights" but Gates did not use this go-to complaint of most Americans (as obligatory as Gov. Palin constantly claiming her 1st Amendment rights are impuned by media criticism. Palin has a total misunderstanding of the 1st Amendment, yet, she's not at all shy about asserting it CONSTANTLY.)

I wonder, is Gates doing himself and even the African American community as a whole a disservice by not discussing these racially neutral rights as often as the 14th Amendment or issues like racial profiling? By failing to do so, is he inadvertently defining African American's fight for civil rights as shooting lower in some ways than what all Americans are entitled to shoot for?

[Yellow#5]

Here's an interesting aside and an update on the 911 caller situation. She held a press conference today, which I just saw online at MSNBC- Andrea Mitchell's program. Apparently, she's recieved threats for making the call, in particular, because the police report that was released by the Cambridge PD in an attempt to rehabilitate THEIR image, was apparently innaccurate, as compared to the tape of the 911 call. The report states there was a report of 2 black males, for instance, and the caller stated there were two people, whom she only saw from behind and one "might" have been hispanic, but she couldn't tell. On top of this, the report released the callers name to the public.

As this press conference was held, the 911 caller had at her side, none other than Attorney Wendy Murphy, an avid victim's rights advocate here in Boston, and I guarantee you, Wendy Murphy is not standing around at news conferences and preventing her client from commenting on the police report for nothing.

I fully expect this person to at least settle with Cambridge PD for some $, if she doesn't press this all the way to a lawsuit.

I wonder where this leaves Professor Gate's situation? Not only were their no good grounds for arrest, but it seems at least part of the officer's report was outright fabricated.

[Minnesotan]

I'm going to move this over to The Lobby, since it's completely off topic in the English forum. I should have done this before, but I wanted to weigh in before words like "trauma" started getting thrown around. I think we've lost perspective a bit if a night at county is represented as a major trauma in one's life.

Maybe this should stay in the rhetoric area, after all.

[kfed2020]

I think we've lost perspective a bit if a night at county is represented as a major trauma in one's life.

You really can't see why this would be significant?

[belowthree]

You really can't see why this would be significant?

I'm pretty sure he said that he couldn't see how this could be labeled as a personal trauma in someone's life.

Significance is an entirely different matter.

[Yellow#5]

Being arrested is a trauma for many people, regardless of how long you spend in jail. It tends to make people think they are guilty of something, even when they've done nothing wrong (especially, the ones who did nothing wrong). Believe me, working for the public defender, the biggest obstacle to overcome with an average person is often convincing them they don't deserve to go to jail anyway, because they often see themselves as "bad" so why fight, they figure. I know watching NYPD blue makes it look like being arrested is the funnest game their is. In real life, especially for an older man who's in his house, jet lagged and a scholar of the negative african american experience with police, this is quite traumatic. True Sociopaths don't seem to mind it, but they are rarer than you think.

But I was not only refering to Gate's trauma, but also refering to this notion of collective trauma, that all African American men might feel to varying degrees, regardless of their personal prior experience with the law, when they are arrested for nothing, depending on how many friends have been arrested for nothing, whether they are aware of all the statistics, etc.

I even think collective trauma is sometimes worse if you havent suffered as much, or suffered recently from the conditions you fear. Gate's was probably having a pretty good life, on the whole, working at Harvard, vacationing at Martha's Vinyard, but who knows how things were for him as a kid or a young man, before he was "Professor Gates."

Between my two Grandmothers, one was born in NY and the other in Hungary. The Hungarian grandmother immigrated just before WWII. She was there for the 1st War, the depression, rise of communists in Russia, beginning of the Nazi rise. She's seen it all, but she's 97 and laughs at everything, never gives a thought to Nazi's or Communists. My other Grandmother, the one who was always in America, just thinking about how bad things must be in Europe, waiting in the States while my Grandfather and her brothers were all overseas fighting, listening to all the rhetoric and watching the films, to her, everyone was a Nazi. She seemed persecuted her whole life. I went to germany to study for 2 years in 1994 and when I told her I was going, she practically panicked and said the Nazis would get me. This is a woman who was never withing 3000 miles of a Nazi, but clearly, she thought about them all the time, because it was for her, a collective trauma, a trauma in her imagination, which is often worse than a real incident, I think.

I put this under English/Rhetoric, etc. because it touches on notions of identity (American and African-American), and yes, trauma and collective trauma.

Please don't dismiss this so glibly if you are going to participate in the thread. I could go post on Politico if that's the level of discourse I sought. If the topic doesn't really interest you, posting is not compulsory.

[belowthree]

I'm not dismissing it. I personally think this incident is extremely lame.

I don't think however, that's it's inappropriate to caution against throwing words like trauma around. These incidents are terrible, but things like this happen all the time. This case is mild in comparison to the typical abuse of power which sometimes takes place.

To use the word trauma in this case and to act like this specific case is a more severe traumatic experience is to denigrate all the much more severe cases that the media isn't happening to spoonfeed you with an appropriate dose of outrage. In my opinion, the "don't tase me bro" incident was more shocking, traumatic and offensive than this particular action (they're both bad, don't get me wrong) but that also wouldn't merit the label of "trauma" that seems to be thrown around so casually in this thread. Further, the public reaction in that case was generally to ridicule the victim involved.

Do us all a favor and reserve the gesticulating over widespread collective trauma for the many more serious cases of this type which happen on a daily basis. To go off the rails on this one seems to indicate a lack of understanding on your part that in the scope of abuses, this one if it existed, was mild compared to what many racially charged neighborhoods face on a daily basis. Given your comment about being a public defender, I would guess you probably have this understanding (indeed probably far better than I do!) but you need to go ahead and take the next step and apply it. Is this really that severe a case in the context of everything else you've seen? If not, I'd really like to hear your opinion again in a few years as a PD yourself if you take that route.

So to get back on topic... if you want to say, for instance, that the officer probably acted "stupidly" in this case, I would agree with you. I would also agree that this case is highly significant because of the media outrage it has received. But traumatic? There we disagree.

But apparently arguing for an ounce of perspective in people's diction is just to completely dismiss the argument? Gah.

Speaking of bias... would we even be talking about this incident if the person wasn't a professor?

[Yellow#5]

belowthree,

Just to clarify again, I'm not specifically talking about Gate's personal experience as trauma, I'm refering to the collective historical experience of the African American community that informed Gate's subjective response to being questioned in his house.

And I DON'T think this subjective experience is actionable under the law, but I think it clouded Gate's perception of the rights he has in that situation objectively, and I think it continues to cloud them. That's my point. I'm concerned that, in some way, being steeped in the history of oppression of black males is perhaps causing Gates to VOLUNTARILY surrender his right to sue for the objective 4th Amendment violation, in favor of litigating the issue of persecution in the media.

This is an issue I hope that the future Harvard Professors of African American studies, who may be reading this board, carefully consider. Know the history of your own culture, but know your more general rights, too. Otherwise, future scholars of African-American studies may inadvertantly be advocating or assenting to a separate-but-equal understanding of their civil rights.

[Minnesotan]

I put this under English/Rhetoric, etc. because it touches on notions of identity (American and African-American), and yes, trauma and collective trauma.

Please don't dismiss this so glibly if you are going to participate in the thread. I could go post on Politico if that's the level of discourse I sought. If the topic doesn't really interest you, posting is not compulsory.

I guess I can respond to each point. 1) Identity is not literary study, no matter how much you try to force it so. This is a political conversation, not an English Department conversation. Thus I moved it to the appropriate forum. I'm not sure why this is so offensive to you that you need to threaten to take your ball and go home, but you're going to have to deal with the call I make as a moderator.

2) I clearly did not dismiss the argument. I, like belowthree (if I gather correctly his/her interpretation), feel this was a stupid incident that need not have happened. I also feel that words like trauma are inappropriate for such a minor issue. Between this case and the charges of racism when people dared to talk (post mortem) about the utter strangeness of Michael Jackson's lifestyle, I am not sure how any self-respecting intellectual can jump on the identity politics bandwagon anymore. The race card has been burned, and it's about time every single action involving a black person stopped turning into a media-supported race war. If this had happened to a white person, nobody would have given a good god damn! What this says is that if you're looking at every life situation for "traumatic" racist events, you're bound to find them everywhere you look. We see what we want to see.

Now, since I only partly engaged in this thread in the first place (just to vent about people who think they're too good to meet their neighbors), it's time you found another target for your righteous indignation. I'm not "The Man" who brings everyone down, so you can redirect your anger at the idiot police officers who arrested the professor.

[Yellow#5]

1) Identity is not literary study, no matter how much you try to force it so. This is a political conversation, not an English Department conversation.

I'm really not the only person who would discuss such things in the context of Literary Theory. You may not study race/identity/power issues as part of your literary studies, but many do, and I was interested in those opinions, specifically. Several departments also expand literary discussion to the interaction of law/policy and power, identity issues, Columbia U for example. You may not go that direction, but many people study literature and lit. theory and study it in different ways.

I never "threatened" to take my ball and go home, I just prefered to get the attention of literature grads with this discussion for my own personal curiousity. Now that it is in the Lobby, it will be more of a current events discussion, and there are already about 1,000 blogs in cyberspace discussing this issue in that way.

2) I clearly did not dismiss the argument. I, like belowthree (if I gather correctly his/her interpretation), feel this was a stupid incident that need not have happened. I also feel that words like trauma are inappropriate for such a minor issue. ...

You can argue that, I argue to the contrary.

...What this says is that if you're looking at every life situation for "traumatic" racist events, you're bound to find them everywhere you look. We see what we want to see.

Yes, there are, and we all have our own responsibility to deal with these, sometimes, as a cultural sub group, we discuss our collective trauma. Sometimes, we organize sub-departments within English departments.

Now, since I only partly engaged in this thread in the first place (just to vent about people who think they're too good to meet their neighbors), it's time you found another target for your righteous indignation.

Right, though I didn't specifically address you, I hoped that people who didn't much care about this issue would just not comment, not chime in to say something like "Gates thinks he's too good to meet his neighbor" when, as the case happens to be, the woman who called 911 worked in the neighborhood, didn't live there, which, if you were interested in this story, instead of sick of the story, you might have known. So I just don't want to make work for you as moderator, and clarify that I don't expect you to necessarily comment on every single thread, even if it bores you.

[kfed2020]

The race card has been burned, and it's about time every single action involving a black person stopped turning into a media-supported race war.

The race card has been burned? As of when? To be honest, I don't even know what that means.

Please do give us a point of reference; because, from what I've seen lately, Minnesotan, you're a little bit too comfortable with your whiteness and it's getting hard for me to see where you're coming from.

If this had happened to a white person, nobody would have given a good god damn!

Weak.

In this case, it didn't happen to a white person. But if it had been Helen Vendler, and not Skip Gates, this wouldn't have happened. Few people would have called the cops on an elderly white woman -- even if she had broken into her house the same way. At the very least, many people would have gone over to see was going on before getting 911 trigger happy. Why is that?

Why is it that someone like Gates would be considered a) more likely to be breaking in, more of a threat?

No one "would have given a good god damn" because the situation would have been quite different.

Social categories matter.

Identity is not literary study, no matter how much you try to force it so.

Are you going to say that works written by people of every gender, nationality, race, sexuality, religion, etc. are all interpreted, appreciated, distributed in exactly the same way? Are you going to say that people of every gender, nationality, race, sexuality, religion, etc. -- given the local cultural histories of each of these categories -- all read and interpret things of every subject the same way -- and that, there for, there's no reason for literary study to take into account these differences?

You're also going to say that the histories of literary production for each of these groups are remotely similar?

Really?

That's awfully stupid.

[Minnesotan]

Kfed: Too comfortable in my whiteness? I think you're too comfortable in your role as victim. If you accuse me of whiteness, I accuse you of racism.

As for name-calling because of a difference of opinion, I think you need to grow up. So I don't think identity politics and literary studies belong together and you do -- does that mean you get to be a jerk in the comfortable anonymity of these forums? Maybe so, but you're the one who gets to choose what role you play, and you're the one who has to live with that choice.

What I meant by "the race card has been burned," for those unfamiliar with card games, is that it has been used to its limit and should be put in the discard pile.

As for Yellow's point about old ladies, that's just silly. The prisons in this country aren't disproportionately filled with old white ladies. Black males make up a much larger portion of inmates than population statistics suggest they should, even in areas where most police officers are non-white. If it were the reverse, I am betting old white ladies would get the cops called on them more often than anyone else (which may help to reinforce the preexisting asymmetry).

Now, please get off your high horses. I agree that nobody (of ANY color!) should be arrested for breaking into their own homes. My point, and it is not much of a stretch, is that you're blowing things out of proportion because you're buying into the same media hype that you're criticizing -- yes, this should be a 4th Amendment issue, not a race issue. The guy has a right to be pissed off and sue the cops who did this. But is it really necessary to turn it into yet one more O.J. Simpson fiasco, just because he was black?

Trauma, indeed!

[Minnesotan]

One last thing: if this has anything to do with literary study, what book are we talking about? Literary study should be about text first, context second -- not the other way around.

[elaleph]

One last thing: if this has anything to do with literary study, what book are we talking about? Literary study should be about text first, context second -- not the other way around.

I would expect a mod to know the title of the board which he moderates. In this case, the title was "Literature, and Rhetoric and Composition"

Who cares that it doesn't address a literary work? This discussion, especially considering that much of it is concerned with the speech used by the 911 caller, is perfectly suited to its ex-forum.

[kfed2020]

Minnesotan:

There was no name-calling. I didn't -- and wouldn't -- call you anything.

I claimed that you seemed comfortable in your whiteness. This is my way of asserting that perhaps our difference of opinion can be attributed to the fact that as an educated and successful person of color (and a black man, no less; and a black man studying Literature, even less) I'm continually forced to think about incidents like this in direct relation to my own life -- not as an outsider looking in, but as someone who recognizes the implications of this happening to someone like me. This is how identity works. I could never say that images of the plight of Mexican immigrants escaping into America, for example, have the same impact on me that they would have on the direct descendants of this immigration. They pain me on a human level, of course, but on the level of identity, it is not the same pain. My assertion is that the Skip incident moves me in a way that it doesn't move you because, in a sense, the worry of being reduced to the expectations of my black maleness (that I'll be violent, that I won't 'belong' in a predominately white community like Skip's neighborhood) is something that is continually going to be on my mind in a way that it won't be on yours. That's what the 'cultural trauma' and its subsequent cultural programming refer to. When a successful, educated white person is arrested, does it remind you of the limits and expectations of your skin color?

By claiming that someone is comfortable in their whiteness, I'm suggesting, not only that they cannot directly relate by virtue of identity, but also that it feels to me that they haven't tried; though, I guess, in your defense, why would you? Your identity allows that you don't have to. Perhaps you would prefer I said that I felt you were comfortable with the privilege of not having to try, because that's truly what I meant. It's not 'racist' to think so.

And as an aside, I find it truly odd that someone would in one sentence accuse people of pulling the race card too often and in the next accuse someone of being racist simply because they reminded them of their white privilege. The worst thing about privilege, it seems, is that people will tend to want to remind you of it. Tough.

But is it really necessary to turn it into yet one more O.J. Simpson fiasco, just because he was black?

Forgetting something? The OJ Simpson case wasn't just big because black Americans made it big. And it most certainly was not big simply because he was a black man who'd killed someone.

We can't really discuss OJ without reminding ourselves of that small detail of his victim being a white woman. Why? Because accusations of violence between white women and black men (and the often subsequent consequences for black men) have a distinct and undeniable history in the US, and this is what black people were thinking of at that time. Whether or not we believe he did it was almost secondary to the powerful symbol of a black man evading the cultural lynch mob.

This is a tangent, but I felt it worth pointing out. These are the kinds of understandings that I'm talking about.

Finally,

One last thing: if this has anything to do with literary study, what book are we talking about? Literary study should be about text first, context second -- not the other way around.

I think the argument is relevant to the Lit board because he's a colleague, and also for the reasons that Yellow #5 offered, but I see your point about us not discussing a text (rather than book; I would hope that the lit board were open to a broader range of texts than just books.)

Still, that doesn't justify saying that identity is not a matter of literary study. It is, and for precisely the reasons that are playing out here, no less. But that's a separate argument altogether.

[Minnesotan]

You see, I disagree wholeheartedly with the assumptions people make about white people and privilege. I was born poor, I've been poor my whole life, and I find that I am often limited in my options because of my gender and color (in fact, not only is it legal to discriminate against people like me, the government mandates it in certain hiring situations!). My job prospects on campus, and my ability to earn grants and scholarships is greatly reduced by what I can only surmise is every other white male out there who has the backpack full of privileges I've heard so much about. How I missed out on that freebie, I'll never know.

If there's a way to get a replacement backpack, I'd be happy to fill out whatever forms it takes.

Long story short, you're right that I won't ever know your challenges; just the same, I would ask for the courtesy of not assuming I have had everything handed to me because of my skin color. You don't know what poor white folks feel like when they are just as bad off as many other poor folks, and yet they are also blamed for every ill of modern society. It might be different if people, every once in a while, stood up and applauded all of the good stuff white males have done, but that would clearly interfere with the political program going on in our English departments. Everyone has a vested interest in identifying a demon to label with their favorite -ism.

I guess, since we're all endorsing a spirit of walking in the shoes of others, I would ask that you consider what it's like to wake up in the morning knowing that everyone blames you for every historical wrong that anyone of your skin color (whether related or not, whether within the last 100 years or not) has ever done. Or has been perceived to have done. That you are not allowed to apply for many much-needed services, programs, and career-advancement opportunities because some of the other folks with your skin color have more money than you, so it is assumed you must not need the same opportunities as others. That if you dare say anything good about your own race, it is insinuated that you are a racist; of your gender, a sexist. Basically, being a poor white male is like being blamed for eating the whole cake when you never even got to stick your finger in the icing.

This is why I am so insulted by ambiguous phrases like "you're too comfortable in your whiteness," and by assumptions of privilege (and therefore dominance, and therefore oppression). It is completely groundless, yet always assumed. Anyone who cared to ask me about the material circumstances of my life would realize that, but why bother when it's easier to assume!

(As for the name-calling comment, I thought you had called me stupid, but you were calling my actions stupid. Which, while offensive, is not the same thing, I'll admit.)

[Yellow#5]

The Fourth Amendment is the "text" that I am trying to put into context with my discussion of Gate's arrest:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

To a lesser extent, I am commenting on the 1st Amendment and the 14th Amendment, as well as the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution in their entirety, as well as all the susequently written case law that is meant to ellucidate them, but I'm focusing primarily on the guarantee of security Americans find in the 4th Amendment and I'm discussing how these promises are interpreted by different groups of Americans.

Now, you could say that the Bill of Rights is not literature, but rather a legal document that is referred to and understood in a discipline-specific way by lawyers. That is one level of interpretation, to be sure, but most every American, whether legally trained or not, has heard of the 4th Amendment, and whether they have ever read it or not, they have a sense of what it means, it influences their culture and understanding of culture, what rights they have as a result of it's existence, and what their proper conduct should be and what the police's proper conduct should be...at least, they think they do. It is this level of "interpretation" that I consider literary analysis. The individual interpretation of rights is formulated in much the same way an understanding of myths or fairytales or folklore are formulated, through imprecise oral discussion, through family traditions, through discussions within the community, and a person's individual understanding of its meaning through these informal interactions is a crucial building block to a person's notion of culture and identity.

What I found interesting in discussing Gate's arrest with white friends who are laymen, (not lawyers) and have never been arrested is that they have an understanding of this text that goes well beyond what is written. If I ask about the "4th Amendment" specifically, they will all agree, no one should be arrested in their house. Many mention "without a warrant" because Law and Order and NYPD Blue type shows have taught the layman American much about interpreting this text that few read. But when you change the question and ask specifically about propper conduct with the police, all will say "you have to comply do whatever they ask." Now, of course, I could walk this back and ask questions about increasingly unreasonable things an officer might ask, and at some point, they will say, "no, of course, you don't have to "X"(write them a check for 1,000 dollars, for example). But most start off from the premise of "full compliance." Many might even say, I would write them the check and dispute it later.

While I agree that ideally, it is best to be polite and respectful of anyone you deal with, including the police, because of the nature of their jobs, they often catch people in emergency situations at times when they are not prepared or able to reach this ideal, (i.e., jet-lagged, cranky, dehydrated, sick, rushing to the hospital, etc.) Furthermore, this is an ideal, but it is not an accurate description of the law, because you do have the right to be cranky and still be secure in your home. The Fourth Amendment doesn't describe, "the right of people to be secure in their home, unless they are exceedingly cranky."

Black Americans have a different subjective experience and a different subjective understanding of this "text" and what promises and protections they are afforded by this "text" in reality. My point in beginning this thread, was that Gates in his various radio appearances and statements, didn't seem to be clinging to this "magical talisman" of American protection the way some other American might, such as a white American or a legally trained black American and I posed the question, whether a learned, successful, African-American intellectual like Gates considers the promise of these protections at all as a part of his national identity as an American.

I've noticed that increasingly, black spokesman have come out for the Urban Defense League, the Southern Poverty Law Clinic and similar legal organizations devoted to "teaching" Constitutional Rights within urban communities, because it is important to get these ideas into everyone's vocabulary of what it is to be "American." So discussing this "text" in terms of it's interpretation among different "identity" groups and the role the text plays in defining that groups "identity" in the first place, is really the issue I wanted to discuss in more depth than an ordinary current events discussion might allow.

One other thing I've noticed when speaking with people about this or even just watching the news, that white Americans, when they hear the possibility raised regarding racial profiling, will immediately begin to criticize Gate's own conduct in his house. Lawyers of any color I've spoken too don't tend to do this, however, they cling to the idea that he was in his house and that that is sancro-sanct, and they can't even get past that fact to be terribly interested in anything else. Many will say something to the effect of "well, whites would be arrested if they said this or that to a cop too." And this goes back to my first point in this post, that at some point, white Americans who are not lawyers have a fundemental misunderstanding or contradictory understanding of the 4th Amendment, whether they are asked the question in terms of the individual's personal rights, or the rights of the police. In the context of Gates, once race is brought up, the divide in white/black America will cause a white person to say, "Gates shouldn't have said this or that thing" in an attempt to attribute bad behavior to a group of "other" people, perhaps reassuring themselves that because they wouldn't act in such a way, their rights are secure -- not realizing, of course, that by even allowing this argument, they put their own rights as well as Gate's rights completely at the discretion of police.

So, I am heartened to hear Minnesotan say:

I agree that nobody (of ANY color!) should be arrested for breaking into their own homes.

But I only hope that in a free country, Gates or Kfed2020 should be allowed to discuss their subjective experience of law enforcement in terms of race or any other subjective factor, without anyone - Black or White Americans- being side tracked from what is a fundemental pomise to all Americans, regardless of the differences in our subjective experience. If those rights are not claimed or actively denied to one segment of the country, it is not only bad for them, but it makes the entire country weaker.

As for racial profiling and whether it exists, you might check out a film called "American Violets" that is based on the Civil Rights class action recently won by Regina Kelly and residents of Hearne, Georgia who were systematically targeted and incarcerated for drug offenses which the Prosecutor in Hearne knew to be false, in order to basically round up black people. A similar incident happened in 1999 in Tulia Texas, where 46 people, predominantly black were arrested in a pre-dawn raid for dealing cocaine and it was later shown to be a completely baseless arrest and in fact a conspiracy on the part of law enforcement.

So "the race card" is not just a rhetorical flourish. It is not something invented to be pursuasive or dramatic. Text and stories can sometimes be used to convey information that describes the real lives of real people. "White Privillege" as I understand it, is not that you are showered with treasure and opportunity, so much as you are free from this type of interference from the arm of government that is ostensibly there to protect, not to persecute. ( I am perfectly willing to discuss the "trauma" of not being rich in America on a separate thread). In the mean-time, I can say that I certainly feel that I have my white privilege. Once I lost the accent of my grandparents, all that was left was my white skin. No one would question whether or not I was a full fledged American, even though I am decended from immigrants, and I've never been accused of being a "secret Hungarian" or a "secret Ukrainian" because my "Americanism" shows in my blue passport and my white face, unimpeachable to everyone.

[Yellow#5]

As for Minnesotan's echo of the Limbaugh "ditto-head" meme:

I was born poor, I've been poor my whole life, and I find that I am often limited in my options because of my gender and color (in fact, not only is it legal to discriminate against people like me, the government mandates it in certain hiring situations!).

I'd like to remind you that this is not communist China. You can get jobs without appealing to the government. You are even allowed to be self-employed, if you are clever enough to recognize that you have a marketable skill. Most immigrants recognize that this market is still accessible to everyone in America, and so they flock here in droves with whatever skills they have, from all over the world to work hard at running their own stores, restaurants, cleaning services, nail salons, mechanic shops, import-export businesses, etc. However, there are a small portion of jobs which make up the entire economy, that are indeed government created, and the government has decided, after considering many studies on racial inequality of income/education over the last few decades, that underrepresented minority groups will be promoted through these positions.

My job prospects on campus, and my ability to earn grants and scholarships is greatly reduced by what I can only surmise is every other white male out there who has the backpack full of privileges I've heard so much about. How I missed out on that freebie, I'll never know.

Don't consider it so much that the government has taken these jobs, grants and scholarships away from you, rather, the government has intentionally created them for someone else, after deciding it would be in the intrest of the common good to do so. Since you were never awarded the job/grant/scholarship originally, it wasn't "taken" from you. You may feel that you're entitled to such a "freebie" but your right to a specific one never vested.

If you feel that a career in scholarship, a predominantly government subsidized market, does not offer you the kind of opportunites for economic advancement that you would like in the form of sufficient "freebies" set aside for you and only you, perhaps you can take advantage of the good education you've already received, make an honest assesment of your own personal skills and get what even academics sometimes refer to as "a real job."