Starfish and Maia, your research, post & comment about the police are VERY important and cut to the heart of the matter, or one of them. It’s clear that police are still policing middle class and affluent neighborhoods, policing against POC. It’s what they are paid to do. Paid to hurt and kill POC.

Maia, thanks for this is well put together, thought provoking post. I see the potential for this thread to grow long over time.

What follows is not the sunniest, so if you or secondwaver think it too harsh, I wont be offended if you decide not to approve, or ask me if I can possibly modify. And if it should read thread-killing to others, just carry on around it. I wont be offended about that either. Just having my say, is all. Not looking to start coming down heavy on anyone.
~

The chapter in the report specifically about racism is an eye-opener. One thing I’ve seen throughout is the attempts to preserve the white persons’ level of comfort on the basis, I suppose, that nobody wants to be called a racist, even when they really are just that. There are things that many white folks think of as simply factual about poc, that are either outright untruths or that are the result of ongoing systemic and/or institutional oppression.

From near the end of the report, (quoting words 7 yrs old at that point),

“What is happening to the police is that a 19th Century institution is being dragged into the 21st Century. … the police never really were the police of the whole people but a mechanism set up to protect the affluent from what the Victorians described as the dangerous classes.”

It’s wise to hold this truth in mind whenever thinking and talking about the police, anywhere, in relation to people of colour, who have been held down in all ways – literal foot on the neck or no, in more recent times.

“I believe that the events of the last few years have not only presented British policing with a challenge so formidable that it has come close to disaster: they have also now given the opportunity to the British Police to reinvent themselves. It is now possible to foresee that, through a fundamental shift of culture, the British police service will remain at the worldwide forefront of policing, with a style which draws its legitimacy from an understanding of current public needs and of the nature of the contract between police and a new generation of the public.”

This sounds pleasant and hopeful, right? To white ears anyway. You’ll find that plenty of poc, everywhere, remain rightly sceptical. Racial Profiling is part of what police forces the world over do, certainly the Western world over. Driving while black (or brown) is fairly well talked about, and is a good way into understanding if some of this is new to you (general you). (Did someone else just talk about this here? If so, sorry to be repetitive)

From further up the report,
Such assumptions are still made today. In answer to a question posed to a member of the MPS Black Police Association, Inspector Leroy Logan, he referred to “what is said in the canteen”, citing simply as an example his memory that ” … as a Sergeant I was in the back of a car and a female white officer on seeing a black person driving a very nice car just said “I wonder who he robbed to get that?”, and she then realised she was actually voicing an unconscious assumption”. This is a mere example of similar experiences repeatedly given to us during our public meetings.“

Rather proves the point, I think. An important part of this gathering of anecdotal evidence is that once the sheer volume of it is exposed it paints a(n empiric) picture that can not be ignored.

As a white woman whose been learning about racism for a good few years now, I’ve become sceptical of words such as these,

Tensions between London’s Muslims and other communities were running high, and there were fears that this could erupt into violence.

A campaign of calming and reassurance began, and her officers provided valuable intelligence to the anti-terrorist branch. Temperatures that had been high, began to cool. In September and October, the number of racial incidents increased, but not by an enormous amount – 6.4% more than in the same months in 2000.

which is from Met winning the battle against prejudice, one of the articles from Race Issues in the UK – Special Report, from the foot of the last link Maia posted in her original piece.

This, particularly,

“But by then the Met had established links – through independent advisers, community forums and family liaison officers – with ethnic minority communities.”

could easily be interpreted as “infiltrating in ways that clamp down/aim to maintain the controlling status quo”.

Anyway, you’ll certainly find (despite the approving poc that are most often chosen to appear in mainstream news items) that the day to day lived realities of most of the people of cultures, colours and religions not “white” is not always borne out, not necessarily honestly reflected in such sunny reports and statistics.

Cynically perhaps, I wonder if there’s simply a “but not all whichever-identifier people are like that” now tacked onto “how to identify a potential terrorist/criminal” teachings that are part of racial profiling. Certainly some higher ups will be getting quite a lot of “sensitivity training”, but I expect that front-line, not so much, except to learn not to say the “really bad” things out loud.

And no matter how “duh”-making it may seem, chances are that some white feminist somewhere has done something similar for the same reason, or even that some white feminist will manage to avoid doing it because of hearing from you.

I also think we have to try and stop be afraid of the reactions we might get as we recognise / analyse mistakes we have made!

I have a post written about something I did, but decided not to publish it after we were accused of being self-flagellating whiny useless hypocrites. I can’t decide if it would be helpful to other white women, if it would seem worth only an eye roll and a great big “duh!” from women who have to deal with racism every day.

i think there’s a real gap for a lot of people. they think you’re only racist if you consciously support it. maybe because there’s so much shallow anti-racist media, on the level of pop songs about being colour blind. that’s the stuff i got in school– basically just “it isn’t cool to be racist! don’t call people names!” no understanding of the white supremacist heteropatriarchy and so on.

i hadn’t thought of the systemic view as pragmatism before, but i can see your point. it gives people a bit of room to consider that ok, some of these policies and actions ARE racist, without distracting themselves with guilt and defensiveness right away.

both “individual racism” and “institutional racism” can be used to avoid responsibility, to pass the blame around without getting anything done. i like to think more in terms of systemic racism or network effects, because for me systems/networks seem obviously about interconnected individuals, whereas institutions are often created specifically to shield individuals from legal responsibility for things.

i get frustrated with how little responsibility is valued right now in mainstream western cultures, and how much blame is used instead. it’s like those “i’m not racist but…” statements. they could be rephrased, “i did a racist thing but it isn’t my fault, i’m not to blame.” i think a lot of white people feel helpless about racism– no idea how to tell when they’re doing something racist, no idea how to do better, no idea how to take responsibility for improving it. so instead, there’s a lot of pointless criticism and blame.

i’d be really into seeing more people’s concrete plans and patterns out in the open. i wish that article about the metropolitan police actually named what they were doing– specific workshops, specific policies– so that other people could figure out how to do better themselves.

I am so overwhelmed by the positive comments we have had already – on this blog, on other blogs, and privately… I have no doubt that there will be those who doubt or mistrust what we are doing (who can blame them, white feminists do not after all have a good track record at confronting race issues) – but the number of people who are already keen to come along with us on this journey is really heartening. Thanks to everyone who has spoken up so far with your encouraging words!