Non-Indictments: For White Officers Only

Sometimes you learn the hard way. Protections of the law, whether just or unjust, are for whites only.

Only white police officers can get away with unjustly deploying weapons against defenseless victims. As we learn with the City of New York’s handling of Akai Gurley’s murder, even Asians, the so-called “model minority” are not shielded by such protections.

After announcing that Officer Peter Liang will be indicted on charges including second-degree manslaughter, the law enforcement complex left their Asian comrade high and dry.

There is no sigh of relief in the Black community for an indictment that should happen, especially when a trial has not yet ushered in a guilty verdict. We have been fooled before by the promise of justice when George Zimmerman killed Trayvon Martin in cold blood, raised hundreds of thousands of dollars from his murder, and still walks free to victimize Black men today. We know that an indictiment is a far cry from a prison time, and that nothing can bring the young and promising future of Akai Gurley back.

The Black community is also well aware that had Officer Liang been a white man, surely a non-indictment would have followed.

For what it’s worth, white men have shot dozens of bullets and murdered victims like Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. They have strangled victims like Eric Garner in Staten Island, New York with their bare hands and were not brought to justice.

Now the white hands of the law are using the unnecessary death of Akai Gurley to suggest that the law enforcement is finally doing the right thing.

Liang should definitely be charged and convicted for the murder of Akai Gurley.

But let us not excuse the countless murders whites have committed against Black people. Those violent, barbaric acts that went and continue to go scot-free. Why should only Asians be brought to justice when they have sinned? Shouldn’t whites also pay for their sins?

The New York Times understands that acts that whites have committed and continue to commit are deplorable. Except, the newspaper only wants to tell you how bad whites are in the past, or in the south, as if to disassociate rampant violence of whites against Blacks in the north and to null and void their current acts of violence.

The New York Times recently run several articles on lynching, a propaganda scheme to suggest that only whites in the south commit horrendous acts against Blacks, and that white media is coming to terms with its wrongdoings.

We know neither of these things to be true.

If the New York Times was so concerned with lynchings, why did the publication fail to discuss the historical and present salience of lynching in tandem with the violent death of Eric Garner in the hands of Officer Daniel Panteleo? Why wait until no white officer has gone to jail for these public incidents of violence and injustice—to talk about lynching?

Condemning acts committed by whites way back then is by no means the same as taking responsibility for violent acts whites commit now.

What the New York Times won’t say is that their racism is losing them customers. Money-hungry corporate types are desperately looking for a way to stop its bank account from draining. There are many whites who do not tolerate racism and therefore put their subscription of the New York Times out for garbage pickup.

Peter Liang is a perfect scapegoat for the NYPD to pretend it cares about unnecessary Black deaths, while also keeping white murderers out of jail, maintaining a protective coat around white privilege.

Liang’s indictment says little about whites value for Black lives. It says more about whites value for white lives and devaluation of anyone who is not white.

Everyday people are not confused by this double standard. Gregory Rosario, a resident raised in the Louis H. Pink Houses in Brooklyn where Akai Gurley was murdered said: “You think if the officer’s not a minority, he would get indicted? If he was Caucasian, he wouldn’t be indicted. In Eric Garner, they had everything on the table and they didn’t do anything. Here there’s no video, no proof, but they indicted him.”

Sorry, Officer Liang, you may have committed the same sin that white officers regularly perpetrate–senselessly killing a Black man for absolutely no law enforcement reason–but did you think your case would end up out of the courts? You should have gotten the memo: non-indictments are for whites only.