Opinion | Matthew Guariglia: 'The police as an institution is not fair, balanced or objective. And yet departments are still relied upon to be the arbiters of what did and did not happen.' - NBCNewsTHINK
The early sociologist Max Weberthat the state has the monopoly on legitimate violence, meaning that in a modern nation it is only the government that is politically justified in using force. But it has also been true — to the detriment of the people — that the government, and especially police, have had the monopoly on legitimate storytelling.
It’s why police press releases are treated with deference, but eye-witness testimony is scrutinized. Our information and criminal justice ecosystems are not built to allow for an easy audit of police departments. For one thing, so much of our data on crime comes from records created and maintained by police departments themselves. Much of that information is held behind the black box of secrecyIn many instances there exists, by design, little evidence to contradict what the police are saying. As was the case in the police killing of Laquan McDonald, in which department administrators had seen thatbut did not discipline the officer until a lawsuit made the video public. And because of the nature of their work, what testimony does exist can be devalued by the press and an unsympathetic white audience — especially when said testimony is coming from people of color or people with even minor criminal records. There is no such thing, however, as a “perfect” witness against police. By claiming they felt threatened, police still have an easy time legally justifying their actions even if there is video. So long as the officer’s side of the story is taken as the definitive version of events, it does not matter who that person is or what they saw.For over a century, Black activists and other victims of police violence have tried to address not just the physical violence, but the narrative erasure of their trauma. As historian, “when African Americans decided to testify about experiencing or witnessing racial violence, they were not merely giving statements; they were resisting violence discursively.” One specific example is etched into the history of New York City. For three days in August of 1900, police and a. When the dust had settled and it was clear that a vast majority of the people that had been arrested were Black, even as their white assailants went free, activists went to work. Their goals were not only accountability and justice, but also to fight against what they called the “whitewashing” of events. The whole city knew exactly what had happened, but police reports, court records and sometimes newspapers often reflected a very different reality — a reality crafted by the police.from people who had been brutalized by the mob, police or both. They published them, disseminated them and held rallies to read and share them. That is what African Americans still have to do: build a counterarchive of stories to combat police spin. That is what African Americans still have to do: build a counterarchive of stories to combat police spin. Cell phone footage has become a new form of testimony. The ability to film police and the right to do so has allowed white America to see what Black America has known for a very long time. Far too often, police body cameras, which were supposed to contribute to the counterarchive, only end up
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