Ferguson Missouri

In the summer of 2014, the people of Ferguson were brutally subjected to a military-style crackdown by local law enforcement following the murder of teenager Michael Brown by Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson. Police officers who appeared more like combat soldiers pointed military-grade assault rifles at peaceful protesters. Paramilitary units dressed in camouflage fired tear gas into residents’ front yards, and armored personnel carriers (APCs) rampaged through the streets of residential neighborhoods.

Mass resistance against police brutality in the US resurfaced after 18-year-old Michael Brown was murdered by the police in August of 2014. The sights of tanks and militarized police forces in response to the subsequent rebellions in Ferguson and St. Louis only blew air on the flames of injustice that were ignited when Michael Brown’s killer, officer Darren Wilson, was not indicted by the US judicial system. Since then, hundreds of Black Americans have been killed at the hands of the police.

I’ve been in Ferguson since November 22, and I don’t think a day has gone by where there hasn’t been a protest, most often multiple protests. There may be one at the Ferguson police station, and another in the St. Louis Shaw neighborhood, just south of the City Center, or perhaps on one of the campuses: Washington University, St. Louis University, the University of Missouri St. Louis, and/or out in Clayton or West County.

Sunday, November 30, Ferguson, Missouri. The governor of Missouri declared a state of emergency on November 17, and this is what’s been happening in Ferguson and St. Louis County, Missouri:

When law is treated as an exercise of sterile objectivity, one where vision matters less than procedure, citizens can best forget that they play any viable role.  Seen through a naked prism of law and order, Ferguson, Missouri simply looks like black indignation against white order. While it would be deceptive to tarnish all arguments with the colour divide, it is unavoidable in parts of a country where authority and policing are inextricably linked to race.  Slavery, after all, co-existed with enlightened notions of human equality for decades.

Barack Obama, the obsequious errand boy for the financial and corporate plutocrats who own the U.S. government, made a pathetic appearance on national television to try to persuade the “natives” to remain peaceful in response to the non-indictment of the Ferguson killer-cop. His inane comments extolling the value of non-violence and the rule of law seemed strangely incongruent with the militaristic rhetoric and policies of his administration over the last few years.

Another Summer has come and gone – it’s time for the annual Fall festival of fantasy, when Americans gear up for another season of national chest-beating.  The more innocuous among us will satisfy the primal urge with football, perhaps binge viewing of a favorite television series, and/or the usual back to school clacque-tivities into which their spawn are channeled.

If you think that police violence has increased recently, you’re right: between July 17 and August 12, five unarmed black men died at the hands of police in New York, Ohio, Missouri and California,.  The worst one was the killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri on August 9.  Brown’s death led to demonstrations, looting, and some of the most extreme examples of police militarization yet seen.  It took a week before Missouri’s Governor and the state police could bring some sort of calm to the outraged community.

The police response to public protests in Ferguson, Missouri in the wake of the deadly August 9 shooting of Michael Brown, Jr., an unarmed eighteen-year-old black man killed by a white police officer, was a prime illustration of the hyper-aggressive nature of policing in America today. The residents of Ferguson fed up with hostile and abusive police behavior continue to flood the streets to demand justice for Mike Brown and other victims of police brutality. They have been joined in solidarity by people of conscience in other cities (e.g., Oakland, NYC).

About a week into the Ferguson crisis, cable TV anchors like Chris Cuomo and Anderson Cooper began to decry the presence of “outside agitators” in the community. This was after SWAT teams with MRAP trucks and M-16 assault rifles came from outside in response to crimes against property (window-smashing and looting) prompted by outrage at the police killing of an unarmed black 18-year-old boy.