SOC Post And Responses 2

Make a post then response to students

On August 9, 2014 in Ferguson, Missouri, Michael Brown, an 18-year-old African-American male, was shot to death after an altercation with Darren Wilson, a 28-year-old white male Ferguson police officer. The disputed circumstances of the shooting, and the decision of a grand jury not to indict Officer Wilson for any criminal charges in relation to the incident led to widespread protest and civil unrest in Ferguson and other cities across the U.S.

Follow this link to The New York Times interactive time line of Michael Brown’s shooting and its immediate aftermath in Ferguson. The resultant protests and civil unrest sparked much media attention about law enforcement's relationship with African Americans. This link is The New York Times video report of a standoff in Ferguson between law enforcement and the protestors. Now look at the findings from a Pew Research Center poll of blacks and whites regarding topics including “confidence in the police” to “progress on racial equality”.

Discussion Board Questions:

1. Why do you think that blacks and whites in the U.S. have very different views regarding the shooting of Michael Brown, the ensuing Ferguson investigations, and confidence in the police?

The Department of Justice (DOJ) report on the investigation of the Ferguson Police Department is a great read. It is a pretty lengthy document but you can look at the highlights of the DOJ report here.

2. Are you surprised by any of the findings of the DOJ report and has it changed your perception of what happened in Ferguson?

Response to both students

Hannah Tedford 

Discussion 7

COLLAPSE

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1. I think there has been a lot of issues occurring with African Americans and police officers. Recently, within the last few years, this problem has really blown up across social media platforms. If you go onto an outlet like Facebook and see the debates that have occurred over such problems, it's easy to see how much opinions vary between the groups. I think that blacks and whites have different views regarding police/victim shootings in general, not just specifically to the Michael Brown case. I believe this happens because blacks are still very aware of the ongoing racism occurring in our country, and it's easy to label such a crime as a product of such feelings. Also, I think that blacks tend to have a more violent/negative stereotype surrounding them, leading many whites to believe that it is a deserved outcome. Unfortunately because of these things our police officers don't have the best reputation, making it dangerous for them and the public who don't agree with them.

2. I was definitely surprised about the highlights from the report. I will be honest and say that before when I would read about these things I would just shrug it off and say "I don't know both sides of the story". I would also try to defend cops to others because I never wanted to believe that people who take over such an important role would abuse it in such a way. I see that it was ignorant of me to think this way because if someone has bad in their heart, they will express it no matter how they choose to do so. The one about police officers looking more at making money than public safety is very sad to me. This is a job they sign up to do willingly, yet they don't even do what they're supposed to. It's very sad to me. 

Emily Wegenke 

Week 7

COLLAPSE

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I think there are several reasons to why blacks and whites in the U.S. have very different views regarding the shooting of Michael Brown. The shooting of Michael Brown is not the first time a person of color has been wrongfully killed because of police brutality, the community is outraged to have another member killed. We saw this in the YouTube video provided as people expressed their frustrations about the matter. In the video, people of color were peacefully protesting and the police forced the protest to end we continued to see people express their frustration during the video about this. As one person explained, how are they supposed to advocate for justice if they are not allowed to peacefully protest. People of color have had to continually deal with this kind of treatment from whites since the start of the countries history. It is not fair to say that all white people do not have similar feelings to these shootings as people of color, but the lack of empathy for these shootings may be from institutional racism. Racism has become so interconnected within our society that there is a lack of acknowledgment of this being part of the reason for the different views on shootings, investigations and confidence in police. 

Sadly, I am not surprised about the DOJ findings. It does however make me more angry about what happened in Ferguson because the report continues to support that police officers in this area act upon racial beliefs and not safety of the public. It was interesting to read about the findings and to see the ways in which police officers disproportionately target the black community, and have gotten away with it for so many years. I would be interested to have the DOJ investigate other areas in the country to see if this is a common trend amongst police officers or if it is specific in southern states or northern states.

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