Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire
  • omnibus

Freedom Rider: Black Support for the Police State
Margaret Kimberley, BAR editor and senior columnist
16 May 2018
Freedom Rider: Black Support for the Police State
Freedom Rider: Black Support for the Police State

“If having black faces in high and not so high places doesn’t save our lives why should we support them at all?”

The worst hate group in the United States is not the Ku Klux Klan or any self-proclaimed alt-right group. The most racist, vicious, and deadly menace to black people in this country is law enforcement. The police, courts and prisons exist primarily to keep as many black people under control as possible. All other claims of usefulness are phony and cover up the racist cruelties inherent to their existence.

Every day one can be see videos of black people being humiliated, arrested, shot and beaten for minor infractions or for none at all. They may be driving, walking, eating, or shopping while black. They may be men, women, or children. The system is made to put as many victims through its maw as possible and all the photographic evidence in the world won’t stop it unless inconvenient truths are told. One of the worst is the reliance on the collaboration of black people who help keep the police state running.

“The system is made to put as many Black victims through its maw as possible.”

The presence of black cops and elected officials doesn’t stem the tide of state sponsored terror. They are in fact put into these positions to defend the onslaught and to silence protest. The black chief of police in Philadelphia defendedthe now famous arrest of two black men in a Starbucks café. Richard Ross initially said, “These officers did absolutely nothing wrong.” Ross was forced to back down and apologize for his Uncle Tomfoolery only after the Starbucks corporation did so as part of its damage control strategy.

Ross isn’t alone in showing subservience to modern day slave patrolling. A black teen in Warsaw, North Carolina was beaten and chokedby police at a Waffle House restaurant and that assault was also caught on camera. Mayor A.J. Connors went out of his way to defend the brutality. He created a video for the sole purpose of saying that the white police officer “Did what he had to do.” Most black officials aren’t stupid enough to express support for white supremacy out loud and in public but they may as well when they do nothing to help their people.

“The carceral state is treated as a sacred cow that the misleaders dare not touch.”

The black misleaders in city councils, Congress and state legislatures rarely assert any politics which are specific to black people. The one institution which impacts our lives the most, the carceral state, is treated as a sacred cow that they dare not touch. Their silence and inaction are tacit admissions that they know the danger to themselves and to the rest of us.

Even when there are positive developments such as the effort to end cash bail, the most important points are missed. It is good that attention is called to this pernicious practice of profiting off of black people’s bodies. But the protest should be against the police state itself that turns minor infractions into felonies and locks up people who should be free.Even those who are able to pay bail and attorneys fees end up devastated. A criminal record determines where or if a person can be employed or even where they are allowed to live.

Obviously, black officials know that speaking out against the police state jeopardizes their political careers and they know that the system expects to continue its assault on black people. And so they choose to acquiesce and condemn us all to constant danger.

“The police state turns minor infractions into felonies and locks up people who should be free.”

If having black faces in high and not so high places doesn’t save our lives why should we support them at all? The rot runs deep and goes from Warsaw, North Carolina to Capitol Hill. Most members of the Congressional Black Caucus voted for the Trump administration’s $80 billion increase to the defense budget. Yet they simultaneously claim to be concerned about cuts to the safety net that are an inevitable consequence of what they supported. Most of them also supported maintaining the infamous 1033 defense programthat provides military equipment to local police departments.

There is an even larger question here about the usefulness of the electoral process itself and the way black people function in it. Elected and appointed offices for black people are paths to permanent employment and lucrative opportunity. They make a deal to get as much as they can for themselves and the rest of us are on our own.

Beware the black person with a big job. Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice made the case for killing over one million Iraqis. Police chiefs and mayors give police brutality the green light. They are as guilty as the killers they defend. It is up to us to call them all to account. Condemnation of the quislings is an absolute imperative.

Margaret Kimberley’s Freedom Rider column appears weekly in BAR, and is widely reprinted elsewhere. She maintains a frequently updated blog as well at http://freedomrider.blogspot.com . Ms. Kimberley lives in New York City, and can be reached via e-Mail at Margaret.Kimberley(at)BlackAgendaReport.com.

Black Misleadership Class

Do you need and appreciate Black Agenda Report articles. Please click on the DONATE icon, and help us out, if you can.


Related Stories

Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
Charles Rangel and the End of Black Politics
28 May 2025
The late Charles Rangel served as a member of the Congressional Black Caucu
Anthony Karefa Rogers-Wright
Temerity, Tartuffery, and Toxic Identity Reductionism…the Latest Democrat Party Hoggwash
21 May 2025
The Democratic Party would rather silence critics like Hogg than fix its own rot.
Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
Graylan Hagler: Capitulation Masquerading as Political Thought
30 April 2025
Liberals continue to condemn anyone who didn’t support Kamala Harris and the latest iteration of neo-liberal treachery.
Anthony Karefa Rogers-Wright
From Uncle Tom to Cousin Cory: (Or, The Curious Case of Mr. Booker’s Senate Floor Minstrel Show)
09 April 2025
Senator Cory Booker’s recent 25-hour Senate speech is hailed by some as an act of resistance.
Jon Jeter
Across the Country, Black Voters Show Signs of Abandoning Black Mayors Who Have Abandoned Them
05 February 2025
The adage that "black faces in high places won't help us" still rings true when you look at Black mayors like Karen Bass, Eric Adams, and Lori
Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
The Death of DEI
29 January 2025
Black people must be discerning about racist attacks on DEI programs while also acknowledging that “diversity” can be a con t
Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
Eric Adams and Daniel Penny Make Black People the Face of Crime
18 December 2024
Daniel Penny’s acquittal was not surprising, and neither is Mayor Eri
Kamala Harris and Donald Trump
Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
Fear is Still the Motivation for Black Voters
27 November 2024
Kamala Harris is now a historical footnote who is heading for the dus
Carlos Sirah
Empire's Overseers: The Two-Party Trap of Blackface Imperialism
30 October 2024
The U.S. political system is perpetuated through the facade of choice.
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
Bassackwards Tribe strikes again!
02 October 2024
“We must be brief when traitors brave <

More Stories


  • Hanna Eid
    Mariategui and American Labor
    02 Jul 2025
    Capitalism’s accelerating crises demand a pan-American labor revolt against Trump’s plundering, bipartisan imperialism, and the neoliberal NAFTA. José Carlos Mariátegui’s century-old warnings are…
  • Essam Elkorghli , Matteo Capasso
    Fabricating Enemies in Times of Decline: NATO 2025 Summit
    02 Jul 2025
    The 2025 NATO summit exposed a dying empire escalating wars and austerity to hide its collapse while backing genocide in Gaza and illegal attacks worldwide.
  • Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
    Did New Yorkers say, No Mo Cuomo; No Mo Turkey Trot with Papa Cop?
    02 Jul 2025
    "Did New Yorkers say, No Mo Cuomo; No Mo Turkey Trot with Papa Cop?" is the latest from BAR's Poet-in-Residence.
  • Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
    The Terrible Origins of July 4th
    02 Jul 2025
    The causes of the July 4, 1776 Declaration of Independence are rarely taught in this country. The American colonists chafed under British rules limiting their settlements and feared they would end…
  • Adam Mahoney
    From Watts to D.C.: How 500 Black Neighborhoods Vanished in 45 Years
    02 Jul 2025
    America’s gentrified neighborhoods have lost 500,000 Black people, while gaining residents of every other race, a study finds.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us